Kitt, a London-based workspace provider, has raised £6.1m ($8.16m) funding in a Series A round led by Hoxton Ventures.
Other investors, including Octopus Group CEO Simon Rogerson and SquareFoot founder Jonathan Wasserstrum, participated in the raise.
The announcement comes six months after Kitt raised £3.6m from Barclay Ventures. The latest Kitt funding round brings the total amount raised by the company to £11.85m.
The managed office platform said it will use the funding to accelerate UK expansion and open its first international office next year.
Founded in 2018 by Steve Coulson and Lucy Minton, Kitt’s platform lets businesses choose then customise their workspace solution.
It connects tenants directly with its landlord partners and automates most of the traditional procedures that are usually undertaken by the office and building managers.
The company said it has grown over 420% in the last 18 months despite lockdowns forcing companies to embrace mass remote working.
“The aftermath of the pandemic has blown open the doors of our industry and accelerated our mission to put the customer at the heart of the commercial real estate,” said Steve Coulson, CEO and co-founder of Kitt. “We are delighted to partner with Hoxton to take the business to the next level as we aim to reinvent commercial real estate across the country and then internationally.”
Kitt says it has placed customers in over 140,000 square feet of space across London since launching in 2019. It counts companies likes Oatly, Mars, and PZ Cussons Beauty as its customers.
Mixing tech and shared office spaces as a business model was popularised by US-headquartered WeWork. However, Kitt’s model relies on landlord partnerships whereas WeWork took out its own leases on office properties.
That strategy saw WeWork scrap its IPO plans in 2019 and its valuation slashed from $47bn to $9bn, when it eventually went public via a SPAC merger in October this year.
Kitt’s competitors include the likes of Hubble and IWG (formerly Regus).
Hussein Kanji, founder at Hoxton Ventures, added: “The office concept has changed drastically as companies look to strike a balance between HQ and people’s homes. The real estate industry needs to innovate and redefine the role of office space for the future. We congratulate Kitt on its vision, which is at the centre of the largest shift in commercial real estate we’ve seen in recent years.”
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