Our Investment in Coconut Software

Innovation can happen in the most unexpected places. Our world is changing at a fast pace and we expect our tools and resources to keep up with the pace of innovation. This is where Coconut Software Corporation (Coconut) enters the picture. Coconut is changing an everyday task – appointment scheduling and innovating it to put the customer back in control and creating a truly digital experience. We’ve been on an exciting journey leading up to this investment and want to share some of the reasons why we decided to lead the Series A round in Coconut.

We first met CEO and Founder Katherine Regnier about a year ago at our downtown office. Katherine was on a trip to Toronto from her native Saskatchewan and a mutual advisor suggested that we meet. Are we ever glad that we did! We were immediately impressed by Katherine as a founder. She had a vision, an incredible passion and excitement for what she was building. She communicated the strategic direction of the business and we were eager to learn more. At that initial meeting, we saw the beginnings of a product that was going to innovate customer experience around a common pain point: scheduling appointments. Since improving customer experience has been top of mind for many enterprises, we have been doing our research into this theme and saw how Coconut was changing the way customers schedule appointments. While we definitely knew Katherine had something there, the business was still very early – in fact too early for where we like to invest.

While we weren’t yet ready to invest at that initial meeting, we did strike a different deal! Information Venture Partners promised to be available for friendly advice and would make a few introductions to people or enterprises we thought would be a mutual fit. Katherine committed to hitting her Series A milestones over the course of the next year and we are happy to say that she hit that goal! Putting your money where your mouth is goes a long way in our fund and that made the decision to lead the Series A much easier for us.

“After meeting Dave and the Information Partners team, I knew this was the team I wanted to work with. They are thoughtful communicators, sophisticated investors, and most of all understand what it is going to take to elevate Coconut to the next level.” said Katherine.  “I believe that along with StandUp Ventures, and ScaleUp Ventures, we have a team behind us to make Coconut a global success!

On closing this deal with Coconut, we are delighted to be working with Katherine and her team, Kevin Kimsa of ScaleUp Ventures and Neal Dempsey of Bay Partners. We’re excited to see the next chapter in the story of Coconut and how they will change the story around customer experience.