Freshworks strengthens top management with four new appointments

Freshworks to scale up headcount by 1000 in 2019, to reach a total of close to 3000 employees

Freshworks, a Software as a Service (SaaS) start-up which has recently announced its entry into the billion dollar club, is into recruitment mode to beef up its top management. The company would be increasing its headcount by atleast 1000 in 2019, taking the total count close to 3000 by end of next year, said senior officials from Freshworks.

The company recently announced the appointment of Suresh Seshadri from US-based AppDynamics as its Chief Finance Officer. The company has also roped in David Thompson, from US-based business intelligence tool provider Domo, as Chief Marketing Officer. In November, it announced the hiring of Prasad Ramakrishnan as its Chief Information Officer and Shivanath Somanathan as Chief Information Security Officer to strengthen its technology leadership.

With the company expanding into multiple geographies, it has brought in Suman Gopalan, who previously worked with Whirlpool, Dell and The Nielsen Company in Asia Pacific, as its Chief Human Resources Officer to ensure it hires the right talent while keeping the company's culture intact, it said. 

"Considering our growth numbers and the stage at which we are, an IPO is something that makes long-term sense for the company. However, we do not have a set timeline right now but are rather working on achieving global growth and strengthening the leadership," said Girish Mathrubootham, CEO, Freshworks. "All our newly appointed CXOs will be working towards scale as Freshworks continues to grow rapidly across various geographies," he added.

The company has been efficient in cracking the SMB business model, which is one of the major driver to its growth. The challenge in front of it is to scale in the mid-market segment and confront the challenges it brings, he said. 

Gopalan is working aggressively on bringing in the right kind of talent as the company is aiming to bolster its team with new hires across all geographies. Thompson is working on brand campaigns that showcase the strengths of the company. The technology leadership is working towards improving its software so as to help businesses serve their customers better.

The company is on the lookout for more talent. "We will be scaling the Freshworks team by at least 1000 in 2019, taking the employee count close to 3000 by end of next year," said Gopalan, CHRO.

Freshworks plans to continue expansion globally with new offices, partners and resellers and it has recently held its first user conference, Refresh 18, in New York. Plans are to increase its customer interactions going forward and the new features will be based on the customer requirement. It has also introduced an AI engine, Freddy, to serve its customers with omnichannel capabilities. 

The start up had initially seen a fund raising spree, where it raised a total of around $250 million upto a Series G funding in August, this year and it acquired around nine start-ups in almost two years, as it grew up from a single product company to a multi product one. In August, when it announced the fund raising, it had said that the post-funding valuation has hit $1.5 billion, almost double the $700 million valuation it attracted in November 2016, when it raised $55 million in Series F funding.

"All of the acquisitions we had made in the past were for a couple of reasons - It was either for the technology that was being built or for the talent required to bolster our team. We are not actively looking for any acquisitions, but, if the opportunity presents itself where the technology or a team will add value to Freshworks, we will consider it," said Mathrubootham. 

Freshworks is headquartered in San Bruno, California, but a majority of the tech talent works out of Chennai, with offices in London, Berlin and Sydney. It has also recently opened an office in Bengaluru. It is also one of the fastest SaaS companies to hit $100 million in annual recurring revenue in June, this year.