The influx of cash, which brings PayIt’s fundraising total above $200 million, comes from Australian financier Macquarie Capital Principal Finance. The company plans to use the money to fuel further growth, particularly in “product innovation,” according to a press release.
"We have exciting plans to further empower governments to deliver consumer-grade digital interactions everywhere, and Macquarie Capital's investment and know-how will serve as a force multiplier in our achievement of that vision," said PayIt Founder and CEO John Thomson in the statement.
The company, which got its start in Kansas about nine years ago, has become one of the most ascendant of the tech firms serving government, quickly signing huge state agencies in Kansas, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Alabama and others, as well as numerous local governments ranging from Palm Beach County, Fla., to Toronto.
It also won an investment of more than $100 million from Insight Partners in 2019 — one of the larger gov tech funding rounds on record.
Notably, PayIt has yet to acquire or merge with any other companies. Especially in recent years, gov tech firms have been using an influx of outside investment to buy up other firms, with examples including the likes of CivicPlus, OpenGov, Granicus and Springbrook Software.
PayIt’s growth has been more organic, with a platform for setting up forms, workflows and handling payments for services spanning many different government activities. The idea is to reduce the friction and frustrations an average person might experience in interacting with the government — by using a chatbot to gather information rather than a form, for example, or by storing their information so they don’t have to re-enter it the next time they need a service, or by offering digital notifications and reminders.
This is the second U.S. gov tech investment Macquarie has made in short order; it just led an $11 million funding round in Velosimo, which creates “connectors” to help different pieces of gov tech software hand information to each other.
