Sydney food and beverage ordering platform Ordermentum has closed a $2.5 million Series A round led by some of the biggest names in its industry.
The cash injection comes from prominent tech investment fund Capital Markets Technology, as well as Nudie Juices co-founder and Ten Network Holdings chairman David Gordon and eBay Australia founder Alison Deans.
Ordermentum offers a cloud perform allowing businesses of any size to place orders and pay for supplies via a mobile app.
The B2B payments platform is now used by more than 3000 businesses across Australia and is transacting over $2 million per month in invoice revenue.
Ordermentum co-founder Andrew Low says the key to the successful funding round was laying the groundwork early through getting an MVP out as soon as possible and completing all the necessary basic governance.
“A large contributor to our success is that we got a product to market and used by customers very early,” Low tells StartupSmart.
Low and co-founder Adam Theobald released an early version of the platform in the very early days of the company to gauge the market interest.
“This approach has challenges but it’s real market feedback,” he says.
The focus on basic governance also served to establish a good foundation to build the startup on, Low says.
“From day one, you should set up brand positioning so you communicate what you stand for,” he says.
Establishing best-practice customer service and communications procedures also meant that from the beginning their end users knew who to call for any enquiry with Ordermentum, Low says.
And tying this all together was one key principle they continue to abide by.
“Take responsibility,” he says.
The latest funding will go towards further developing the platform and building out new features to assist with scaling, as well as growing the sales and account management support team.
“We’ve worked very hard to get a product out there and we’re excited by the feedback we’re receiving,” Low says.
“We’ve got a long way to go and we’re looking forward to that journey walking hand in hand with our customers and our investors.”
The star-studded list of investors will also be joining Ordermentum’s advisory board.
“They were the advisory board we felt would give us the best chance,” Low says.
“We looked to work with a partner that first had a proven track record of delivery themselves, who could guide us down the right path with the choices we have to make and aligned with the values of the founders.”
In addition to monthly executive meetings, Low says they can pick up the phone any day to ask their advisory board members for advice.
“This is now a personal relationship, it’s not just a financial transaction,” he says.
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Dinushi Dias is a freelance journalist and a former StartupSmart reporter and multimedia content producer. She is the co-founder of Melbourne-based production house Dinushi & Power.
