Construction fintech company Built Technologies has raised an $88 million Series C funding round.
The company, launched in 2015, started out building digital tools for lenders to manage their workflows for construction clients. Its tools have been used on over $68 billion worth of construction products, according to the firm.
Built, which now also develops software for construction companies to manage their own finances, has now raised $137 million to date.
The latest round was led by Addition, the new fund helmed by former Tiger Global tech investor Lee Fixel. (One of Fixel's successes was helping to lead Tiger's investment in Peloton.) The round includes funding from fintech specialists Canapi Ventures as well as returning investors including Index Ventures, Goldman Sachs Investment Partners, Nyca Partners, Fifth Wall Ventures and Nine Four Ventures.
Entrepreneurs such as Square Financial Services executive chair Jackie Reses, SurveyMonkey CEO Zander Lurie, Tendo CEO Dan Goldsmith, and Plaid's head of partnerships Lowell Putnam rounded out the list of investors.
Built Technologies' co-founder and CEO Chase Gilbert told Insider that the idea for the company was born two years before its founding, in 2013, when an advisor held up an iPhone and asked why no one could use it to handle construction finances.
In order to shift traditional construction finance systems online, Built started working on tools for banks that were already lending money to companies in the field. Banks previously invested a lot of time performing due diligence and keeping track of their investments. Built's first product — which is simply called Built — is a construction loan administrator that help banks manage and expedite those tasks.
"Lenders are, in a way, the ones responsible for building the community around us — where we live, work, and play," Gilbert said. "None of it is possible without the money."
Working with lenders also gave Built access to other stakeholders involved in construction; they started to work with Built naturally via their lenders. The company was then able to "follow the money," as Gilbert put it, and start building products for construction spending, too. It has now built a suite of tools for lenders and construction companies alike.
Gilbert said that the company's strategy of fostering what he described as connective tissue between lenders and builders paid off during the last year, when digital communication became a necessity during the COVID-19 crisis. Their risk management tools performed especially well, Gilbert said.
"All of these people with a construction portfolio need a pulse on construction collateral in a world where, in some cases, we're not able to leave our houses," Gilbert said.
The company was not originally planning to raise money at this time, Gilbert added. But Fixel offered to help them with a new round in order build even more tools for clients. By tapping into the $88 million, the company will continue to develop tools for lenders but also plans to launch newer offerings for construction companies.
One, a product called Built Pay, is like "Venmo for construction," Gilbert said, bringing a modern payment platform to construction that will reduce the amount of time it takes for contractors and subcontractors to be paid. Another tool in the works would further automation of construction-specific accounts payable, reducing the administrative time that construction companies need to spend making sure everyone is paid.
Gilbert also said the company is working on ways to use the five years of operational data they've collected so far, with intel on everything from how much items cost to how long projects take.
"Whether lender, owner, or contractor," Gilbert said, "this information is really valuable to everyone."
