Horizon Technology Finance Corporation led a $15 million venture loan facility to Branded Online, Inc. (dba "Nogin"), of which Horizon funded $5 million of the initial $10 million draw, and a private investment vehicle managed by Horizon Technology Finance Management LLC, Horizon's advisor, funded $5 million.
Nogin delivers commerce as a service to a growing community of consumer and lifestyle brands in the fashion, consumer packaged goods (CPG), beauty, health, wellness and other retail industries. The company's full-stack intelligent eCommerce platform drives results by including sales optimization, experienced knowledge experts, artificial intelligence-driven marketing, fulfillment, customer service, and research & development. Their customers also leverage Nogin's full-spectrum creative design, photography, marketing, logistics (including warehouse and fulfillment), merchant services, and even fraud protection services. Nogin fully manages a brand's front-to-back-end operations, helping increase customer revenue and profitability, all while enabling its customers to focus on the core reasons they are in business.
"Nogin's enterprise-class, commerce as a service platform represents a diverse range of global consumer brands. Its proven technology sheds significant operating expenses, enabling leadership to focus on the outcomes that matter most: products and profit. Nogin provides the experience, tools, and technology that help brands drive revenue and reduce costs, while staying ahead of the ever-changing retail landscape," said Gerald A. Michaud, President of Horizon. "We are excited to support Nogin's growth as it continues to add high-profile consumer brands powered by its intelligent eCommerce platform."
"The vision that drives Nogin has its roots in the rich history and experience of its founding team members, who strongly believed that they would create an exciting and innovative new approach to eCommerce that included everything a brand would need, from the ground up," said Jan-Christopher Nugent, Chief Executive Officer of Nogin. "This team built a technology-driven platform that facilitates growth opportunities and successfully combines the power and learnings gained from a growing community of brands, knowledge experts, and machine learning solutions that help brands compete more aggressively with 'Big Retail'. Horizon's support validates that ground-breaking vision. Simply speaking, we free up brands to focus on important strategic priorities like product innovation, exploring deeper connections with their customers, and forging new avenues to grow their brand equity."