-        Steele brings 25+ years of leadership experience at the world’s leading technology companies

-        Namely raised $60M in a growth round led by GGV Capital; Tenaya Capital joined the round, along with early investors that include Sequoia, True Ventures, and Matrix Partners

NEW YORK, NY -- August [2], 2018 -- Namely, the leading HR platform for mid-sized companies, today announced the appointment of Elisa Steele as the company’s CEO. Elisa has more than 25 years of leadership experience at several of the world's leading technology companies. She last served as President & CEO of Jive Software and has held senior positions at Microsoft, Skype, Yahoo!, NetApp, and Sun Microsystems. Elisa joined the Namely Board of Directors in 2017 and has held the role of Head of the Office of the CEO since May.

“Throughout my career, I’ve seen firsthand how leadership has the power to transform workplaces for the better,” said Elisa Steele. “Namely is the leading all-in-one platform in the mid-market for a reason—it empowers HR, enables employees, and drives strategy at the leadership level. Today, we serve over 1,000 clients with our best-in-class software solution and have scaled to process $12bn in payroll. This strong market position enables us to seize the vast opportunity across mid-sized companies who have traditionally been underserved in the market.”

“Serving alongside Elisa on Namely’s board, I have already seen her make a tremendous impact,” said David Skok, General Partner at Matrix Partners. “Namely is addressing a critical challenge: companies must fight to retain the best talent. It is key to provide employees with the same seamless technology experiences that they enjoy as consumers in their workplace applications. That’s one of many areas where Namely excels and why it will continue to grow.”

Under her leadership, the company completed a $60M growth round last week. GGV Capital, whose investments include Airbnb, Square, and Slack, led the round, alongside Tenaya Capital. Namely’s major investors, including Sequoia Capital, True Ventures, Matrix Partners, and Scale Venture Partners, all participated in the round, marking their continued commitment to Namely.

“We are thrilled to lead this growth round for Namely along with many of the top investors in SaaS,” said Jeff Richards, Managing Partner at GGV Capital. “We also could not be more excited to back Elisa Steele, whom we have known for many years and believe is one of the top executives and board members in the technology industry.”

"Since partnering in 2015, we have seen Namely establish itself as the data-driven, people-centric platform of choice for mid-market HR. We have long admired Elisa, and we are confident that her expertise will drive Namely's continued growth and success," said Pat Grady, Sequoia partner and Namely board member.

Namely has reached a number of milestones this year, from surpassing $50M in ARR (annual recurring revenue) to opening a large-scale operations center in Atlanta, alongside its existing offices in New York, San Francisco, Austin, and LA. Namely continues to be recognized as the only engaging and modern solution for the mid-market, receiving accolades such as inclusion in the Cloud 100 in both 2016 and 2017. With Elisa at the helm of a stellar management team, including Graham Younger as President & CRO, Dan Murphy as CFO, Paul Rogers as CTO and Kerry Prine as SVP of Operations, the company is poised to continue to drive industry leadership in it sector.

About Namely

Namely is the first HR platform that employees actually love to use. Namely's award-winning powerful, easy-to-use technology allows companies to handle all of their HR, payroll, time management, and benefits in one place. Coupled with dedicated account support, every Namely client gets the software and service they need to deliver great HR and a strong, engaged company culture. Namely is used by over 1,000 clients with over 175,000 employees globally. Headquartered in New York City, the company is backed by investors including Sequoia Capital, GGV Capital, Matrix Partners, Altimeter Capital, Tenaya Capital, Scale Venture Partners, and True Ventures. For more information, visit www.Namely.com.