BCV principal Zeeza Cole and Headline VP Taylor Brandt wrote this article in collaboration. You can follow them on Twitter here and here to keep up with their thoughts on the venture landscape, the future of work, vertical SaaS and more.
After spending months assessing the state of the industry, we are excited to publish our inaugural Vertical SaaS 50 list.
This is an amazing group of companies and their founders across a wide variety of industries, including healthcare, logistics, construction, transportation and more. We compiled this list based on submissions and conversations with many investors and founders. Bain Capital Ventures and Headline have met hundreds of early stage companies in vertical software and have invested in leading vertical SaaS businesses like AppFolio, TruckSmarter, Housecall Pro and Homebase.
Taking all of this into consideration, we are confident this list is an embodiment of some of the most promising early stage (pre-seed through Series A), primarily US-based companies in the market. These companies have a combination of strong markets with durable tailwinds, founders with deep domain expertise and compelling signs of early traction. We’re excited to see them continue to thrive.
You will see in this list a representation of many of the concepts we discussed in our market assessment from earlier this year, with companies like Seso reaching the agriculture industry in the early stages of digitization, Walla and Snaptrude reinventing early vertical SaaS winners (Mindbody and Autodesk, respectively) and Coperniq inventing industry-specific technologies for solar.
This list is just the beginning — we want to keep hearing from the next generation of best in class vertical SaaS companies! We believe that we will see many transformational companies in this space over the next decade, and we are eager to invest and develop a community of founders making this happen. If you are building in the space, please reach out to us at zcole@baincapital.com and taylor@headline.com.
Agave Industry: Architecture, Engineering and Construction Location: San Francisco, CA
Aktos Industry: Debt Collection Location: New York, NY
Amplio Industry: Electronics Location: Indianapolis, IN
MagicSchool founder Adeel Khan is a former teacher and principal whose AI platform is saving teachers time, fighting burnout, and helping schools build responsible AI experiences for students.