Tupl, a Seattle startup that helps telecom companies make their networks more efficient, is in the process of raising a $7 million funding round, according to SEC filings and company executives.
As of right now, Tupl has raised $3.1 million of a $4 million round and Tupl CEO Petri Hautakangas said an additional $3 million in notes will convert to stock once the round is complete, bringing the total raised in this round to $7 million. This adds to a $1.5 million round raised by the company last year and brings the total amount of money raised by the company to $8.5 million.
Tupl uses artificial intelligence to help telecom companies understand their customer data and make better decisions about network efficiency and customer support. It has built a series of products that automate decision-making processes for low-level customer support inquiries and give network engineers a better picture of the health and efficiency of their networks at any given time.
Hautakangas said Tupl now has 37 employees and has signed a “major customer contract” in the U.S. and a few others in Japan. The company is based in Seattle, but has offices in Spain and Japan and plans to expand headcount over the next year.
CTO Pablo Tapia, a former T-Mobile engineer, founded the company in 2014, and Hautakangas joined in 2015 after a long career at Nokia. Hautakangas would not disclose any of the company’s investors, but Jim Judson, a former member of wireless legend Craig McCaw’s Eagle River Investments venture firm, is chairman of the company’s board of directors.
