Talent matching startup Eightfold AI raises $220 million in round led by SoftBank Vision Fund 2

FILE PHOTO: Talent matching startup Eightfold AI's logo is seen outside its office building in Mountain View, California, U.S. in this undated handout photo. Eightfold AI/Handout via REUTERS

By Jane Lanhee Lee

(Reuters) - Eightfold AI, a talent matching platform, said on Thursday it raised $220 million in a funding round led by SoftBank Group Corp's Vision Fund 2 that doubled the company's valuation since the previous funding round to over $2 billion.

Eightfold AI helps companies evaluate talent by scraping data from company sources such as sales and customer management or human resources platforms along with public data from patents, publications or design portfolios.

“We will integrate with all those systems and bring the employee data all in one place and use that to build what we call a 360 degree profile of each and every employee,” said Ashutosh Garg, founder and CEO at Eightfold AI.

The profile will help employees find other suitable jobs within the company or help managers identify them for promotions or new jobs. The tool can also be used when recruiting new employees and suggesting new courses that employees can take to advance their careers, said Garg.

He said over 100 companies and some U.S. states are customers, and that Eightfold AI is used in over 110 countries and available in 15 languages.

In March, the Indiana Department of Workforce Development announced it was offering Eightfold AI to help unemployed workers find jobs, and Garg said some other states will announce that people collecting unemployment benefits must use Eightfold AI.

Deep Nishar, senior managing partner at SoftBank Investment Advisers, said Eightfold AI took a more holistic approach than other companies offering solutions to recruitment and career management. He siad he expected it could grow to be “bigger than all of them combined”.

Many of SoftBank’s investments have been in areas utilizing technology, especially artificial intelligence, in different industries.

(Reporting By Jane Lanhee Lee; Editing by David Gregorio)

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