Member Article

Ecommerce app Poq has raised a further £3.5m led by Beringea

An ecommerce firm that has provided the tech powering the apps of some of the UK’s biggest retailers has raised another £3.5m to further expand its customer base.

Funding in the company has been led by previous investor Beringea with additional funding coming from Meyer Bergman and Barclays, and brings total funding in the London-based tech firm to £7m.

Its Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) platform which supports both iOS and Android enables retailers to build out their own shopping apps, with Poq’s platform providing real-time updates, customer insights and usage data.

Angled at the booming app economy, the company has already snagged some pretty big retailers, including House of Fraser, Missguided and Holland & Barrett, and has begun to make moves into the US market after signing up US department store Belk in the past year.

Oyvind Henriksen, Chief Executive and Co-Founder, believes that the app economy, which is set to be worth $6.3bn by 2021, still has some way to go before it has reached its full capacity and that the vast bulk of this growth will be driven by mobile sales.

He commented: “Poq is dedicated to making the transition to mobile as smooth as possible for retailers. With our customer-centric approach to app design, our apps provide the best possible experience for customers when shopping on the go.

“We’re incredibly lucky to have received continued support and enthusiasm from Beringea over the course of our journey, and we’re excited to see what opportunities this next round of funding will bring us.”

The firm has said it hopes to sign up more ‘large and international’ retailers for its platform as a result of this funding, and is planning developments which will allow their client’s in-house developers to customise their apps themselves.

Eyal Malinger, Investment Director at Beringea, added: “We have been incredibly impressed with Poq’s rapid expansion in such a short period of time.

“Year on year, Poq’s innovative platform attracts more and more mainstream retailers to create shopping apps to supplement their main sites, bringing the shopping experience to life via mobile.

“Poq is a cost-effective and technically superior alternative to the expensive and monolithic retail apps that agencies typically deliver.”