Frankfurt, 20 February 2014. FACELIFT, a leading technology provider for Facebook marketing solutions, has secured the largest publically known Series A investment in a European company for social media technology to date. Via Corporate Finance Partners – now ACXIT Capital Partners, an international family office has invested USD 15 million in the fast-growing Hamburg-based company to accelerate further expansion.
FACELIFT, founded in Hamburg by Benjamin Schroeter and Teja Töpfer in February 2011, offers FACELIFT FanActivator™ a unique all-in-one enterprise solution for performance-oriented Facebook marketing.
FACELIFT FanActivator™ is the technological interface between Facebook and companies (advertisers). It comprises four modules: Apps, Timeline Manager, Ad Manager and Analytics. Combining all the relevant Facebook marketing applications on a central platform, FACELIFT FanActivator™ offers companies and agencies a performance-solution for creating, publishing, moderating, managing, and rating all their promotions and campaigns on Facebook. The full integration of the “Ad Manager” module is just one major differentiating factor as compared to other social media management systems. The FACELIFT FanActivator™ platform is a SaaS (Software as a Service) solution, hosted entirely in Germany, ISO 27001-certified, and therefore meets the highest IT security standards.
In just three years, financed from its own cash flow until this investment, FACELIFT has quickly grown to more than 60 employees and has over 500 well-known customers, including blue chip clients such as Bayer, Deutsche Bahn, o2/Telefonica and Philips, becoming a European leader in the fast-growing social media management space. To extend their competitive advantage, the founders of FACELIFT decided to take on external capital for the first time. With a USD 15 million Series A financing round, FACELIFT received more funding than any European company in this sector before.
“We will massively accelerate our growth with the capital received. In the next 18 months, we plan to treble the size of our team to 150 employees, further internationalize the business, and bring product innovations to the market even faster. Where appropriate we will also look at targeted acquisitions of special service providers.” – Benjamin Schroeter, CEO and cofounder of FACELIFT, says of the future corporate strategy.
“From the start, we wanted to enable companies and brands to use the diverse possibilities offered by Facebook for their marketing and advertising with high levels of success. The investment provides us with the necessary resources to continue bringing the best talent to FACELIFT, to further expand our market-leading technology position, and to quickly realize our vision of a unique all-in-one platform for high performance social media management.” – says Teja Töpfer, COO and cofounder of FACELIFT.
According to Andreas Thümmler, CEO of Corporate Finance Partners, who played a significant role in the financing process, “FACELIFT has developed into the best-in-class German company in a new growth market. With this financing, FACELIFT will be in a position to very quickly expand its successful business model. In doing so, FACELIFT has also kick-started the consolidation of the market.”
The two founders, Benjamin Schroeter and Teja Töpfer, will continue to own the majority of FACELIFT and control company operations after the financing phase.
Corporate Finance Partners – now ACXIT Capital Partners – acted as the exclusive financial adviser to FACELIFT brand building technologies GmbH and its shareholders
FACELIFTbrand building technologies GmbH was founded in Hamburg, Germany, on February 8, 2011, by Benjamin Schroeter and Teja Töpfer. The Hamburg-based technology company has grown quickly with the FACELIFT FanActivator™ platform, a unique all-in-one platform for professional Facebook marketing and advertising. FACELIFT currently has around 60 employees and over 500 well-known customers, including many global brands and agencies. FACELIFT is part of the Facebook “Preferred Marketing Developer Program”. The company has grown organically to date and has demonstrated profitable growth in every quarter since its foundation. (www.facelift-bbt.com)
About ACXIT
ACXIT Capital Partners is a leading independent corporate finance and investment advisory firm for mid-market clients and entrepreneurs in Europe and beyond. Since 1998, ACXIT offers its clients comprehensive corporate finance advisory services including M&A and capital markets advisory as well as restructuring, equity/debt and strategic advisory. As an independent, privately owned firm we maintain offices and representations in Frankfurt, Berlin, Munich, Leipzig, Zurich, Hong Kong and New York, as well as strong alliances in France, China and India. (www.acxit.com)
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