Fountain Raises $100M as Employees Keep Looking to Jump

Fountain, the ATS focused on high-volume hiring, raised $100 million in an investment led by B Capital Group, according to media reports. The investment comes as an extension of the company’s Series C round, and brings its total funds raised to date to $225 million.

CEO Sean Behr said the company is now “very, very close” to unicorn status as it comes up on a $1 billion valuation, said TechCrunch.

Although we’ve seen some reports of the Great Resignation showing signs of easing as more workers decide to stay put, the movement of employees to pursue new opportunities is continuing. In May, some 20% of employees told PwC that they were likely to switch jobs at some point over the next year. About 35% plan to ask their employers for a raise in that period.

To name just two of their reasons, said TechCrunch, few opportunities for advancement and less-than-stellar benefits.

‘Great Resignation’ Difficulties

“The Great Resignation has been extremely difficult on the hourly workforce, with Covid restrictions adding complexity to how hourly workers can execute their responsibilities,” Fountain CEO Sean Behr told TechCrunch.

In addition, all of the moving around by hourly workers is making hiring more challenging for employers, with most of them expecting it to become even more difficult during the remained of 2022. “That’s led companies to canvass the software market for solutions, particularly applicant tracking systems (ATS) with features that promise to streamline aspects of the job candidate search process,” TechCrunch said.

“Nearly 70% of the global workforce is hourly, and yet we saw that most hiring software was designed for hiring more corporate positions,” said Behr “As the gig and service economy exploded, the legacy ATS companies failed to evolve with it.”

Fountain said its ATS has processed more than 68 million job applications, and has helped larger hourly employers hire more than 9 million workers in some 75 countries.

The company’s ATS, combined with the dynamics of the current job market, “has propelled Fountain into a long and accelerated period of growth, as the company has seen a ten-times increase since a Series B investment in September of 2019 that has only continued to push the company into tripling business each year from 2020 to 2021,” observed UNLEASH.

High-volume hiring has become an increasingly active sector lately. Earlier this month, Phenom, launched a high-volume solution that relies heavily on AI.

By Mark Feffer

Mark Feffer is executive editor of RecruitingDaily and the HCM Technology Report. He’s written for TechTarget, HR Magazine, SHRM, Dice Insights, TLNT.com and TalentCulture, as well as Dow Jones, Bloomberg and Staffing Industry Analysts. He likes schnauzers, sailing and Kentucky-distilled beverages.