Apperian gets funding boost, targets enterprise apps

Apperian has closed $9.5 million in venture funding with investments from three major venture capital firms—North Bridge Venture Partners, Bessemer Venture Partners and Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers’ iFund—adding to the seed funding provided by CommonAngels and LaunchCapital.

“We’re very pleased with the quality of partners we’ve been able to align with the company,” said David Patrick, CEO of Apperian.

The Boston-based company specializes in mobile application management for enterprise organization, with a platform that helps enterprises of all sizes create customized apps for internal use. Apperian’s EASE platform (for Enterprise App Services Environment) helps businesses create, deploy and manage apps for mobile devices based on Apple’s iOS, and will soon support Android apps as well.

“The option today for someone to deploy an app is to go to Apple and get it approved and put on iTunes, and a lot of companies aren’t interested in that,” Patrick said. “The EASE platform is targeted at companies that want to develop their own apps and deploy and manage those apps internally. It’s very easy for the user to come on and set up their own apps for their employees.”

EASE runs entirely in the cloud. The Apperian SDK lets developers create and deploy commonly used enterprise apps in hours, and there is no charge for deploying their custom apps on up to one hundred devices.

The funding will be put toward expansion of the company and the EASE platform, Patrick said, including new functions and reporting capabilities and expansion to platforms beyond iOS and Android. Apperian customers include Procter & Gamble, Dupont, AAA, Intuit, The Estee Lauder Companies, Cisco Systems, Talecris Biotherapeutics, NetApp and The MITRE Corporation.

“We’re also going to be developing templates for commonly asked-for apps,” he said. “There are a lot of apps we’ve had numerous requests for.”