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Planday has developed an online rostering system for all types of businesses that use a flexible workforce, such as restaurants, hotels, stores, call centers and gyms.
Today the vast majority of small and medium-sized companies are handling their internal organisation, such as duty roster planning, with physical boards and homemade spreadsheets.
It is time consuming, and even the smallest mistake can quickly become costly. With Planday’s system these time consuming and manual processes are automated.
Planday digitises all the traditional workflows with a communication and project platform that can also be accessed on mobile devices. The smooth processes will give each company a competitive advantage.
“We find that there is a very large, and so far unmet, need among small and medium-sized businesses that have employees with changing working hours,” says Christian Brøndum, co-founder and CEO of Planday.
A Danish/American platform for further growth and capital
In 2014 Planday received investment from the venture company Creandum. Planday first met Creandum during their stay at SCALEit in 2013, a week’s stay in the entrepreneurial mecca Silicon Valley in San Francisco, where the team toured the visionary entrepreneur city together with Innovation Center Denmark.
“Finding and selecting the right VC takes time and many meetings. For us as a company it required that we learned to pitch our company and potential. Creandum immediately understood what we wanted to do with Planday and that we had a unique technology. Cooperation, valuation, ownership and all other contractual details all came together. They understand us, they understand SaaS and they think globally,” Christian Brøndum explains.
Klaus Nyengaard enters
In the beginning of 2015 Planday received their second investment as the experienced entrepreneur and business angel Klaus Nyengaard entered the company. Rather than taking an active role in the board of directors Klaus Nyengaard acts as a sounding board for Christian Brøndum and the other directors. The capital, his knowledge and experience should help Planday with their continued growth adventure.
“Our goal is to become a global leader in this kind of duty roster planning and we go for an annual growth of 100 percent. We are well underway to internationalize our business and expect to enter three to five new markets in 2015,” Christian Brøndum explains and continues:
“Klaus Nyengaard has already taken the trip with Just-Eat, which today is a huge success. We want to succeed at least as well”.
Klaus Nyengaard was attracted to Planday as they fit well into his portfolio of investments, where he focuses on workflow and online marketplaces. Also the team itself and their growth potential were crucial factors.
“Planday is an exciting company that has all possible conditions to become the predominant player in global rostering. It was an opportunity I would not let go of,” Nyengaard says.
Markedsmodningsfonden
In April 2015 Planday received yet another investment. This time the money came from the Danish fund ‘Markedsmodningsfonden’. Markedsmodningsfonden aims to promote growth, employment and exports, particularly in small and medium-sized enterprises in areas where Denmark has special strengths and potentials. The fund recently gave out 7,5 mio. dollars to promising startups. Among these were Planday, who received 405,000 dollars.
The money should help Planday to customise their solution to manage foreign labor market conditions, such as vacation rules and tip to increase the solution’s market potential globally.
As part of their growth strategy, the team has also recently moved to a new office to hold their 53 employees. Out of the 53 employees 25 came in 2014 and Christian Brøndum expect to hire as many in 2015, to service the more than 50,000 employees who use Planday software in their workplace today.
Meet Christian Brøndum at TechBBQ tomorrow, May 20. Tickets are still available here
