Australian company Deputy is aiming to become a household name in workforce management on the back of the global trend toward shift and casual work.
Sydney-based Deputy has developed cloud-based software that simplifies time-consuming tasks such as rostering, arranging leave, finding emergency cover, or sourcing workers at short notice for maintenance or repairs.
Deputy, which already has clients in 70 countries and offices in Australia, the US, the UK and the Philippines, has received $US25 million ($A33 million) in funding from Boston-based venture capital firm OpenView, which focuses on software companies seeking to expand.
The investment in Deputy is the biggest that OpenView has made in its 10-year-plus history.
Deputy plans to use the funds to develop new products and expand marketing.
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"One day, Deputy will be a household word when people come to consider what they are going to be doing, who they are going to be doing it with, when they're going to be doing it - and they will generally have a proper and meaningful relationship with their place of work," Deputy co-founder Steve Shelley says.
Mr Shelley said shift workers comprise nearly 60 per cent of the world's labour force, but the technology to serve those workers and their employers was unsuited to such a large, complicated task as time tracking and scheduling.
The software can track staff attendance, time worked and location, and forward the information to payroll, thereby eliminating more time-consuming labour.
Staff can use the software to swap shifts, notify their boss that they are sick, or apply for leave - all through using a smartphone or tablet.
The employer can check on staff via a smartphone, even if the employer is on holiday overseas.
"With the support of OpenView, we will be able to accelerate the product road map, new products and supercharge the go-to-market plan," Mr Shelley says.
Deputy's chief executive, Ashik Ahmed, says the number of shift workers in the US grows by about one million each year as the workforce becomes more casualised, especially in the retail, healthcare and aged care sectors.
Mr Ahmed says says Deputy has gained great traction in Australia in the hospitality sector while, in the US, Deputy has had a strong uptake in the healthcare sector.
Deputy also has customers in the child care, retail, franchising, cleaning construction, security, agriculture and aviation sectors.
