john-beckett-channelsight
John Beckett, who built the first Ryanair website when he was 17, has raised €3.3m for his latest venture ChannelSight.

ChannelSight creates 40 new jobs after raising €3.3m

15 Oct 2015

ChannelSight, a company led by John Beckett, who built the original Ryanair website when he was just 17, has raised €3.3m, which will result in the creation of 40 new jobs.

The company provides a ‘Buy Now’ e-commerce button for some of the world’s biggest consumer brands.

The company will create 40 new jobs, increasing its headcount to 74 people.

ChannelSight, an e-commerce enablement and analytics company, raised the €3.3m in a round led by Nauta Capital, with participation from ACT Venture Capital and Enterprise Ireland.

‘The rise of shoppable content is changing the face of advertising, making it easier than ever for consumers to make a purchase online while giving brands greater visibility into media effectiveness’
– KIERAN DUNDON, CTO, CHANNELSIGHT

“Already the team has done an impressive job in no time and their customer successes and the market opportunity ahead clearly positions the company as thought leaders in the space,” said Carles Ferrer, London-based general partner of Nauta Capital.

Beckett’s entrepreneurial flair sparked 15 years ago when he was 17 when he built the first Ryanair website with schoolpal Tom Lenihan. After school he stayed in the technology business and built an enterprise software company called Eirtight Technology.

E-commerce and analytics

ChannelSight was founded in 2013 by CEO John Beckett, CTO Kieran Dundon and Niall O’Gorman.

The company is reporting seven-figure annual revenues and operates in 37 countries worldwide on behalf of brands that include Cadbury, Oreo, Philips, Veet and many others.

“We have developed highly sophisticated technology that is already being used by some of the most respected global brands such as Philips, Mondelez International, RB and Bosch,” said CTO Kieran Dundon.

“This investment will help us to scale at a faster pace and enable us to ultimately help brands and partners to capture a bigger slice of an online shopping market that is estimated to be €477bn in Europe this year alone and growing at 15pc annually.”

ChannelSight seamlessly connects users who are engaging with a brand’s digital content by providing a cross-platform, omni-channel ‘Buy Now’ button service that allows online shoppers to quickly locate a partner retailer where they can easily purchase a given product from any device.

“The rise of shoppable content is changing the face of advertising, making it easier than ever for consumers to make a purchase online while giving brands greater visibility into media effectiveness,” said Dundon.

“ChannelSight facilitates a frictionless path to purchase across all owned, earned and paid media and this end-to-end visibility from shoppable content is the next frontier for brands.

“By simplifying the customer-buying journey across all channels including online video, brand websites and, uniquely, at scale on multiple social media sites like Twitter and Facebook, we ensure that when a consumer is motivated to make a purchase, they can do so easily without competitive distraction.

“The data is what is really valuable though – by helping brands to optimise their advertising and other content we can not only increase direct and indirect conversions, but close the loop to improve the return on investment from their entire marketing spend across all digital channels,” Dundon said.

Looking for tech jobs in Ireland? Check out our Featured Employers section for information on companies hiring right now.

John Kennedy
By John Kennedy

John Kennedy is a journalist who served as editor of Silicon Republic for 17 years. His interests include all things technological, music, movies, reading, history, gaming and losing the occasional game of poker.

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