That's one conclusion to take from today's news that alternative data startup Thinknum had raised $11.6 million in a series A round from investors including Green Visor Capital, according to a statement. Joe Saunders, the Visa CEO who took the network public in 2008, is the fintech VC's general partner.
Thinknum will use the money to invest in the product, find new clients like corporations, and hire engineers to its staff of about 20, according to CEO and founder Justin Zhen. He declined to comment on valuation.scrapes websites, or extracts information using an automated software program , and then puts the data into easy-to-use formats so investors and analysts can examine what it says about everything from job listings to store locations to reviews. The service is simple to use and doesn't require a technology or data science background.
The startup, which raised $1 million in seed money from investors including Green Visor in 2014, has been profitable since 2016. It's doubled revenue in each of the last two years and grown its roster of clients into the hundreds. Eight out of the top 10 investment banks use it.Hedge funds are watching a key lawsuit involving LinkedIn to see if they can spend billions on web-scraped data
Thinknum is one company among hundreds in a the growing field of alternative data, techniques to find, extract and provides insights into a company's health that aren't readily available from conventional sources like financial reports and economic indicators. Subsets include web-scraping, satellite imagery, flight tracking, mobile device geolocation and oil ouput.