Seattle startup Ganaz, which provides payroll and HR tech for agricultural workers and employers, has been acquired by Beacon Holdings.
Ganaz co-founder and CEO Hannah Freeman announced the deal Wednesday on LinkedIn, saying the public benefit corporation “is in great hands” at Beacon, which “is building momentum for our next exciting season.”
Freeman indicated she is stepping away from the company to “catch my breath, spend more time with my daughter, and dream about what’s next,” she wrote. “I’ll miss our team & customers, but will be cheering you on from the sidelines.”
Ganaz launched in 2017 and has raised more than $10 million, with its last disclosed funding round in June 2021. That financing valued the company at $26 million, according to PitchBook. Terms of the acquisition were not disclosed.
Beacon, based in Toronto, buys software businesses serving traditional industries and provides shared technology and operational resources. The company said in September that its portfolio included 45 software businesses.
Ganaz’s platform provides employee onboarding, training, communication and analytics tools. It also offers a Mastercard payroll card that gives unbanked workers access to digital banking. Employers save time and money by skipping paper checks, while workers keep more of their pay by avoiding check-cashing and high remittance fees.
Ganaz received GeekWire’s 2023 Geeks Give Back Award. “We founded Ganaz to make life better for farm workers, and we do that by building technology that agricultural employers love and can’t live without,” Freeman told GeekWire in 2023. “We build our tools to help both workers and employers prosper, and that kicks off a virtuous cycle that helps agricultural communities prosper as well.”
At that time, the startup was serving more than 250,000 agricultural workers in the U.S. and Mexico and 100 employers in the sector.
The company has about 17 employees, according to LinkedIn. Freeman did not say in her post whether Ganaz will continue as a subsidiary or whether its employees will receive job offers from Beacon. GeekWire has reached out to Freeman for comment and will update the story with any reply.
