London-based Paddle becomes BGF’s latest unicorn

London-based Paddle, a provider of payments infrastructure for SaaS companies has become the second BGF portfolio company to become a unicorn after raising $200 million at a $1.4 billion valuation earlier this month.

The funding round, which was led by KKR & Co Inc., is being used to accelerate the company’s global go-to-market initiatives, fund continued product development and finance Paddle’s recent acquisition of ProfitWell, the Boston-based provider of subscription metrics and retention automation software.

BGF has backed the fast-growth business since 2016 when it led a $3.25 million series A funding round. At the time, Paddle was four years old and had been growing at a rate of 400% per annum.

Since then, BGF has provided a further £3.5 million across two separate fundraises and remains a minority investor in the business.

Paddle follows the likes of Multiverse, the edtech firm founded by Euan Blair, game studio Tripledot and fintech GoCardless in becoming UK-based unicorns this year. It is also BGF’s second billion-dollar business after Gousto which achieved the status in 2020.

Ian Downing, investor at BGF, commented: “We’ve backed Paddle for six years and in that time the business has grown at a remarkable rate, scaling its operations on a global level and employing more than 200 people worldwide.

Today the business is used by over 3,000 software companies in more than 200 markets. This is an incredible feat of growth.

“Alongside Gousto, Paddle is now BGF’s second unicorn. We remain a supportive partner of the business and look forward to building even more game changing unicorns in the future.”

Founded in 2012 by then 18-year-old Christian Owens, Paddle focuses on building tools for software companies to handle payments including checkout and subscription management.

The acquisition of ProfitWell, a provider of subscription metrics and retention automation software, will help Paddle’s mission to remove the barriers to growth for SaaS companies around the world.

 Paddle and ProfitWell have shared a common goal: maximising revenue for businesses by taking care of the operational and financial obstacles that are costing countless software sellers unnecessary time and manpower every year. ProfitWell will add huge value to our offering. We couldn’t be more excited to have Patrick and the team on board helping us achieve our mission of powering growth for SaaS businesses everywhere.

Paddle CEO Christian Owens