Danish HR tech startup Platypus raises $2.5 million to boost employee retention through cultural alignment

Copenhagen-based HR tech startup Platypus has raised $2.5 million for its SaaS tool that helps align organisations with the people who comprise them, revealing insights about on-the-ground company culture and identifying fitting potential candidates. The round included investments from social impact fund Mustard Seed MAZE, the Danish state fund Vaekstfonden, Inventure, Preseed Ventures, Speedinvest, the Nordic Web Ventures and some angels. In a press release, the Danish company says its software that “helps transform company culture from a static, top-down mission statement into adaptable, measurable data of what employees actually value in a company”. The result is that new hires are a better fit, team members are more satisfied and stick around longer, and employers save a lot of money. The “talent lifecycle solution” works through gamification: potential and current employees are asked to reflect on values across work-related measurements, such as people, behavior, organisation and workplace. The data is then aggregated to compare and predict how people’s individual values add to company culture. Platypus co-founder and CEO Nico Blier-Silvestri has over 15 years of experience managing HR functions in companies like Unity Technologies, Trustpilot and Peakon; most recently he was Chief People Officer at Revolut. “The future of work, whether remote or not, is all about finding smart ways to cope with retention issues. Close to 90 percent of the early-leavers ⁠— that is, people who leave their employer within the first 18 months on the job — do so because of the cultural misalignment, and we know for a fact that a technology like Platypus can be game-changing for businesses for years to come,” he says. Blier-Silvestri founded the startup with Daniel Bowen in February 2019. According to a press release, the business had international customers in Latvia, Singapore, Sweden, the UK, and the US within ten months. Now the team will use the fresh funding to accelerate early-stage growth and customer traction.

Photo: Co-founders Daniel Bowen and Nico Blier-Silvestri