Mr. Tetu said Coveo, which still has money left over from its last financing in early 2018, plans to use the cash for acquisitions, particularly if the economy sours.Quebec City entrepreneur Louis Têtu has become one of the few Canadians to create two different billion-dollar technology companies after his latest firm, Coveo Solutions Inc., raised $227-million in an equity financing led by the Ontario Municipal Employees Retirement System.
Past investors Evergreen Coast Capital of Silicon Valley, Quebec’s FTQ Solidarity Fund and the Quebec government’s Investissement Québec investing arm also participated in the financing. Mr. Têtu invested in Coveo in 2005, then became chief executive after his former company, Taleo Corp., was purchased by Oracle Corp. in 2012 for US$1.9-billion., plans to use the cash for acquisitions, particularly if the economy sours.
Coveo is a leader of an emerging category of enterprise software that builds on the limited capacity of past search tools used internally by corporations by offering enhanced AI-driven capabilities. “It’s way more than search,” Forrester Research Inc. analyst Mike Gualtieri said. Canadian recreational vehicle maker BRP Inc. uses Coveo for its dealer self-service portals. “It’s like Google for me – I see no gaps," said Krystel Perreault, BRP’s customer insights lead, who said visits by dealers to the portal increased by 45 per cent over two years as they were able to find answers to their questions online rather than calling in to the company. “It’s a better user experience for the dealer – user-friendly, intuitive and easy to browse,” she said.