Public-safety tech firm Mark43 announces $101M in funding
The public-safety software firm Mark43 on Monday announced it’s received $101 million in investor funding, which executives said they’ll use to develop new products and continue the company’s international expansion into Canada and the U.K.
The company’s products — which are used by police in cities such as Boston, Washington D.C., Seattle and Atlanta, as well as state police forces in New Mexico and Louisiana — include platforms for computer aided dispatch, records management and data analytics. Scott Crouch, Mark43’s cofounder and chief executive, told StateScoop the funding will be used to solidify its position as “the leader in the industry.”
“We’ve been around for eight years, whereas most public safety companies have been around in this space for many decades,” Crouch said, noting his company recently won the business of Australia’s New South Wales Police Force. “We’ve kind of established ourselves as a leading global player in cloud software, and this $101 million will only help accelerate that even further.”
Crouch said the company also intends to build new capabilities into its software and to advance its business in the U.S., particularly as the adoption of cloud software has accelerated among government agencies during the COVID-19 pandemic.
In particular, Crouch said he’s been impressed by how police agencies have tailored his company’s software to meet the unique needs of their communities, such as the Seattle Police Department, which he said uses Mark43’s records management platform to aid in behavioral crisis reporting.
“Public safety technology in a lot of cases is really the lifeblood of software in a city,” he said. “If you’re powering the 911 dispatch system, that is so mission critical to protecting the safety of residents.”
The U.S. is currently amid an upgrade to next-generation 911, an IP-based communications platform that allows the exchange of multimedia such as photos, videos and location information between callers and public safety answering points, as well as between PSAPs themselves.
In addition to its funding announcement, Mark43 also named Ganesha Martin, a former director of the Baltimore Mayor’s Office of Criminal Justice, as its vice president of public policy and community affairs.
