Care.com, a care portal covering everything from childcare and tutoring to senior care to pet care to housekeeping, recently raised $50 million in its fifth round of funding. Institutional Venture Partners (IVP) led the round, with contribution from existing investors Matrix Partners, NEA, and Trinity Ventures.
Care.com links up to other care providers and serves as a database and connection point for families. The site current counts 7 million members in over 15 countries, and has signed up accounts with over a million American care-givers. The company charges families a one-time fee for access to its database, and offers a WorkPlace program for larger companies to offer as a perk incentive for employees.
The company has been busy this year, and last month acquired Besser Betreut, Europe’s largest care portal and a Red Herring Europe 2011 winner. The company also recently launched in the UK and Canada.
“People finding access to good care is a major issue,” said Sandy Miller, general partner at Institutional Venture Partners, told Bloomberg. “Once you move to the level of care, it’s such a sensitive, personal purchase that you want a way of doing it that’s more controlled, more trusted, more vetted than you would if you were buying a toaster.”
The company competes against a number of companies offering similar services such as the babysitting service SittingAround, the cleaning aggregate Housekeeper.com, and the pet-sitting site DogVacay. However, Care.com differs from its competition by offering all services under one roof, which makes sense. If you’re leaving town and need someone to look after the kids or Grandpa, chances are you’ll need someone to feed Fido or vacuum the living room too.
It’s that sort of blanketed approach which attracted the size of the funding round, stated Sheila Lirio Marcelo, Founder and CEO of Care.com.
“It is … a validation of our multi-revenue business model and multi-service platform, as well as our track record of growth…,” Marcelo stated.
Of the 300 companies IVP has invested in, 91 have gone public. Perhaps this latest later stage investment puts Care.com on the same path once the markets crawl back from the Facebook IPO crater, though the company may also ripe for an acquisition, a popular alternative exit for later stage companies in a difficult public market these days. Either way, Care.com has plenty of investment fuel for its trajectory, as this latest round of funding puts its total venture fuel at $110 million.