Kickscale raises close to €1M to Revolutionize Sales with AI
Kickscale, an Austrian SaaS startup that is doing pioneering work in the field of sales optimization with artificial intelligence, is raising a first round of financing close to a million euros to expand its AI to help improve win rates of sales teams.
Among the investors are the scaleup founders Stefan Lederer and Christopher Müller (YCombinator), Michael Kamleitner (Swat.io, Walls.io) as well as the Austrian business angels Hermann Futter (Compass Group) and Gernot Singer (Exit of immosuchmaschine).
In addition to these investors, funding was received from FFG for a joint research project with the TU Graz.
Sales meetings often fail due to a lack of understanding of customer needs, poorly trained salespeople or incorrect positioning. Finding out why sales conversations are going badly is often difficult and costly.
This is where Kickscale comes in with the AI-supported sales coach. This makes it possible to automatically analyze sales conversations and extract customer statements that make a purchase decision. By using Kickscale, win rates can increase by 32%.
The fresh capital will be used for the further development of artificial intelligence and software. This offers an innovative way to reliably find what really works in sales meetings to close the deal faster.
The platform analyzes conversations, identifies the sellers' strengths and potential for improvement, generates automatic conversation protocols and makes customer needs visible.
“We are convinced that our platform is at the forefront of Innovation in digital sales. With the use of artificial intelligence, we will redefine sales conversations and customer interactions,” says Gerald Zankl, Kickscale CEO & Co-founder.
“The innovative Kickscale technology and the experienced team will redefine sales . The investment and research funding underline the potential and need for such a solution,” says Stefan Lederer, CEO & Co-founder of Bitmovin
The financial resources will be used to invest in further innovations such as aggregated analyzes and integrations into third-party systems and invested in the distribution of the platform. Companies from all over Europe such as Finway, eCommerceDB , Symvaro Walls.io and ContractHero already trust Kickscale.
Press Contact
Gerald Zankl, gerald.zankl@kickscale.com
Mobile: +43 664 88697790
Press photo
The founding team, from left to right: Markus Jenul (CMO), Fabian Riedlsperger (CTO), Gerald Zankl (CEO) and Herwig Gangl (Advisor) in the Kickscale development center on the TU Graz. Photo Sabine Grün
Download the press photos in original size via https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1hlOj2Yz-BLvUeQWB7ENJ0vvckrppaffp
About the founders of Kickscale
Kickscale is led by an experienced team of former managers and IT experts. Gerald Zankl, Markus Jenul, Fabian Riedlsperger and Herwig Gangl founded Kickscale to optimize sales. Previous companies where Zankl and Jenul were managers and consultants include scaleups such as Bitmovin, Anyline , Holo-Light, which altogether grew to a total value of over 500 million US dollars. Riedlsperger is closely connected to Graz University of Technology and is an expert in the field of artificial intelligence. Gangl is a top manager and was an executive at IBM and partner at PWC . He brings with him decades of experience in management and technology consulting. The founders, with roots in Carinthia and locations in Vienna, Graz and Klagenfurt, set out to make sales easier and more efficient. Since it was founded in 2020, the company has been funded with its own funds and support from KWF (Carinthian Economic Development Fund), Vienna Business Agency and the Chamber of Commerce funded.
About Kickscale
Kickscale (www.kickscale.com/de) is the pioneer in sales conversation analysis. The company specializes in optimizing sales and customer conversations using artificial intelligence. The technology enables companies to refine their sales strategies, make data-driven decisions and develop a deep understanding of customers, which on average results in an increase of win rates by 32% and time savings of over 30 hours per month per employee.
Kickscale's AI-powered sales coach analyzes conversations, suggests improvements and generates valuable customer insights that can be used company-wide by other departments (e.g. marketing, product, management) to optimize the sales process and increase sales. Users of the software include B2B companies such as Finway, eCommerceDB, Symvaro, Walls.io and ContractHero.
Further statements from investors
“We use Kickscale ourselves and therefore know that a lack of understanding of the customer needs, addressing the wrong target group or inadequately coached sales reps are often the cause of lost deals. Figuring out why sales conversations fail is difficult and costly. This problem affects all B2B companies with virtual customer interactions. Kickscale offers an innovative way to quickly find out why sales conversations fail and how they can be improved. This makes the investment so attractive for me.”,
“Companies spend billions in communicating with potential customers. 80% of these are lost after the first meetings with sales representatives due to poor sales discussions. Kickscale solves this problem in an unprecedented way and is already very successful, especially in the german-speaking market. Personally, I also see great synergies with my portfolio, since sales is a big topic for all startups," says Gernot Singer, founder of immosuchmaschine and investor in Kickscale.
“Artificial intelligence offers countless areas of application in sales. Customers must be understood as best as possible in order to be able to sell more and adapt one's own offering to the customer. It is essential to know data points from sales conversations in order to continuously optimize conversations. This is exactly what Kickscale’s groundbreaking AI-supported technology helps with,” says Christopher Müller, co-founder of Bitmovin, investor in Kickscale.
“As a long-time investor in technology-driven industries, I am convinced that artificial Intelligence will fundamentally change sales. Kickscale is on the top of a revolution that not only increases sales and efficiency, but also enables unprecedented customer loyalty and market understanding,” says Hermann Futter, Managing Director of the Compass Group and investor in Kickscale.
Kickscale and the changes in the sales environment
Recent developments at Kickscale reflect the current trends in sales that are expected in 2024. Sales teams are of particular importance. Sales is changing, and companies must react flexibly to these developments in order to remain competitive.
A key trend is the increased use of artificial intelligence in the sales process to better serve customers, operate more quickly and at the same time make processes more efficient. Greater integration of data analytics and metrics in sales management is another key point. Kickscale enables companies to make data-driven decisions and optimize their sales strategies based on real-time information from sales conversations. This trend is becoming increasingly important as companies need to use their resources more efficiently and change strategies more quickly to be successful.
The investment in Kickscale underscores the importance of these trends and shows that the industry is ready to invest in innovative solutions that can sustainably change sales.
With the fresh capital, Kickscale will set the course for a successful future and the mission Drive to transform sales through advanced technologies and data-driven decisions.