Chat commerce firm Clickatell has raised $91m (£68m) in its Series C funding round. The round was led by Arrowroot Capital, with participation from Kennedy Lewis Investment Management, Endeavor Global and Harvest.

Clickatell said it would use the funds to scale and expand three key areas. Firstly, accelerated development and innovation of its Chat Commerce offering. Secondly. expansion of its footprint in the US. And thirdly, scaling of sales and marketing efforts on the back of growing demand from leading brands. It also said the funds would allow the company to significantly grow its engineering skills. It has already earmarked over 200 positions, with a strong focus on boosting its African skills complement in the coming months.

“In 2019, Clickatell was the first to launch chat banking, bringing banking services functionality to chat channels. Our successes would not be possible without the trust and collaboration of our customers, some of Africa’s largest and most successful companies in the world,” said Pieter de Villiers, Clickatell Co-founder and CEO. “We look forward to working with businesses and financial institutions across the continent to enable Chat Commerce, the future of digital commerce and engagement. Soon, every consumer in Africa will engage family and friends via chat plus connect, interact and transact with the brands they love through their favourite chat platform.”

Clickatell processed more than 30bn interactions, and 2bn commerce transactions during the COVID-19 period alone. It serves more than 10,000 customers, including leading global brands such as Coca Cola, Deloitte, Booking.com, IKEA, Standard Bank and Visa. Its recently-launched Chat 2 Pay offering includes assisted (chat desk) and unassisted (bots) chat and secure payments capabilities.