WeddingWire is the latest D.C. tech company to take a big lump of growth equity cash from an outside investor.
This quarter has been huge for the growth category, a phenomenon mostly driven by out-of-market private equity firms finding funding targets in this region.
WeddingWire’s $25 million financing from Boston-based Spectrum Equity follows a $136 million investment in Vienna-based Alarm.com from Technology Crossover Ventures and a $50 million investment in Columbia-based Tenable Network Security Inc. by Accel Partners. In July, Silver Spring-based Sonatype Inc. said it had pulled in $25 million in a round led by New Enterprise Associates.
In each of the above deals, a funder injected tens of millions of dollars into a well-established tech brand, with the intention of hitting the gas pedal on product development and marketing.
The WeddingWire funding is another sign that D.C. has many more growth-ready tech companies than once thought.
D.C.-based Revolution Growth, for example, has so far done all of its deals in this region. When I spoke with Revolution Growth Partner Ted Leonsis in May, he mentioned that “the ground isn’t as tilled here” compared to Silicon Valley – a reference to the investor-friendly valuations to be found here. That’s probably still true, but more tractors showing are up every day.
