Ramp – a forecasting decision science startup that is transforming how global finance teams plan for the future – has closed a $5 million or R90 million seed round, which it intends to utilise to streamline the onboarding of new clients to allow for scale.
Ramp was created in 2018 when its founders realised that the root cause of poor revenue forecasting is that, in 99% of businesses, the financial modelling still takes place on spreadsheets that are no longer fit for purpose. They found that spreadsheets are largely inaccurate, time-consuming and open to ‘subjective’ interference from different areas of the business with their own agendas.
Ramp is a global company, headquartered in the UK, with a large staff complement in Cape Town. Its founders hail from the Mother City.
Cape Town-born Dan Marcus, Ramp Chief Executive Officer and Co-founder, says that the platform enables finance teams to take the guesswork out of forecasting: “The majority of quarterly target ‘misses’ are not due to company performance, but rather to the quality of the forecast itself. In other words, it is factors that could have been predicted at the time that are being missed.”
With Ramp, CFOs and finance executives can run scenarios and arrive at forecasts in minutes – versus weeks or months – thus predicting customer behaviour, future revenue, and the annual growth of a firm, in real-time, at the press of a button. No more costly consequences of incorrect resource allocation, wasted marketing spend, underinvesting, and missed targets.
Marcus explains that Ramp users control their inputs and determine the reporting metrics to suit their businesses, while the Ramp model does all the work. “What is so powerful about Ramp’s platform, and the success it has seen to date, is that companies can directly compare the forecast with reality and see just how accurate it is. The forecast can then be positioned alongside data-driven, intelligent insights backed by the Ramp team’s legacy in the business,” explains Marcus.
Cohort-based forecasting
To achieve its unmatched speed and accuracy, Ramp’s forecasting platform has unlocked the power of cohort-based forecasting – a technique used to extrapolate the behaviour of different groups of customers for a product or service, from the moment they sign up.
The concept of cohort-based forecasting is well understood within B2C but is notoriously difficult to implement properly and at scale. This is because the deeper companies go, the more layers there are. Ramp uses multiple dynamically-selected statistical models for different cohorts in any forecast. It uses an opinionated view to model the interactions between the different levers of a business, with additional models to optimise inputs such as seasonality and live operations.
“Our platform dramatically increases the accuracy of revenue forecasting, in a fraction of the time it would take in spreadsheets. We’ve moved the forecasting process from taking weeks, or even months, to mere minutes.” says Marcus. “Yet what really excites me about the platform are the strategic decisions that we empower businesses to make. Our platform has given some of our clients the confidence to invest in growth through marketing, while other clients value how we reveal the evidence they need to cut costs. The insights we enable can be game-changing.”
The value of seed funding
Marcus says that the long-term goal is to position Ramp as a single source of truth for the future of businesses, from which prescriptive and proactive analytics services can stem. “We’re at the forefront of this new product category and it’s great to have such renowned investors believe in this vision and join us on this journey,” he says.
“We are very excited to support Ramp in this next phase of growth by co-leading their seed round,” said Paul Lehair, Investment Director at AlbionVC. “As an ex-CFO of a B2C startup, I am blown away by Ramp’s unique approach to solving the business-critical problem that is forecasting. We are thrilled to back the team and their ambition to create a new category leader in this space.”
“As a former product manager, I am impressed by Ramp’s innovative solution for forecasting, which is a crucial aspect for any business,” said Tara Reeves, Managing Director – Venture at Eurazeo. “I believe its product will be of great value for teams in product, finance, and marketing, and we are excited to support the team in its mission to become a leader in this field.”
Space Ape Games CFO Hong Nguyen said: “We immediately saw the benefit of receiving sophisticated forecasts in minutes, so we are deploying Ramp on new and existing titles.”
Chris Benjaminsen, Co-Founder and Director of Channels at FRVR added: “Insights from Ramp gave us the confidence to significantly scale our UA budgets.”
Building on momentum
Prior to founding Ramp, Marcus previously built Magnetic Software with another Ramp Co-founder, Jan Pickard, who now fills the role of Chief Operating Officer. That business was subsequently acquired by Silversoft in 2018. In his previous position at King Digital Entertainment, Ramp’s London-based Chief Strategy Officer, and Co-founder, Angus Lovitt played a vital role in scaling the world-renowned Candy Crush game.
Since its inception, Ramp has acquired a reputable portfolio of gaming clients. It recently welcomed Space Ape Games, the award-winning gaming company revolutionising mobile entertainment; FRVR; Pixel United; and Netspeak Games.
