Tulip, the manufacturing app platform born out of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, is hard at work “arming the rebels” of the manufacturing industry. The Somerville-based company plans to double in size, thanks to a recent Series B round of $18.4 million in funding.
Tulip is used by many of the the world’s major manufacturers, including Nautique, New Balance and Kohler to create easy-to-use apps that boost productivity on the shop floor — no coding required. With IoT connections and real-time production insights, the platform is assisting the rebellion’s leaders, otherwise known as frontline engineers, with the digitization of factories across the globe.
We’re arming the rebels – the manufacturing engineers who want to change how they work by using digital tools.”
“Tulip’s growth over the past few years has redefined the possibilities of Industry 4.0. We’ve launched manufacturing’s first platform-as-a-service and shown a strong return on investment for our customers,” said Natan Linder, Tulip’s co-founder and CEO in a statement. “We’re arming the rebels – the manufacturing engineers who want to change how they work by using digital tools.”
Led by Vertex Ventures U.S. with participation from NEA and Pitango Ventures, the Series B round will allow Tulip to expand its product, engineering and sales teams. The company is positioned to more than double its employee headcount by the end of the year, with an emphasis on research and development, customer success, sales and marketing.
The funding is the latest in a series of recent wins for Tulip. In 2018, they unveiled the manufacturing industry’s first app library and Factory Kit, a series of tools to easily build IoT-enabled apps. They also teamed up with Bosch and launched a device ecosystem, including a growing number of devices that can be paired with Tulip’s IoT solution to aid in shop floor productivity and efficiencies.
“The manufacturing workforce has been left behind by technology,” said Sandeep Bhadra, partner at Vertex Ventures U.S., in a statement. Bhadra will be joining Tulip’s board of directors. “In the same way that workflow software from Salesforce and Atlassian have made sales and engineering teams agile, Tulip’s shop floor management apps supercharge factory production teams.”
The recent funding comes on the heels of an exciting year for Tulip, which experienced 400 percent growth in 2018. They currently employ over 50 people in more than 14 countries — and they won’t be slowing down any time soon.
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