Meeting Scheduler Tungle Raises $5 Million

Tungle, a Web-based meeting schedule tool, has raised $5 million in Series A funding. Commonwealth Capital Ventures led the round, and was joined by seed backers JLA Ventures and Desjardins Venture Capital. 

PRESS RELEASE

Tungle, the ultimate scheduling service, announced today that it has secured $5 million in Series A funding. The round was led by Waltham, MA-based Commonwealth Capital Ventures. Existing investors, including JLA Ventures and Desjardins Venture Capital, also participated in the round.  The funds will be used to accelerate the company’s marketing and engineering activities.

“We chose to work with Commonwealth based on its excellent long-term track record of supporting entrepreneurs who are building successful businesses focused on professionals,” said Marc Gingras, chief executive officer and founder of Tungle. “As we expand our focus toward commercialization, we are excited to surround ourselves with knowledgeable and seasoned veterans in Commonwealth Capital Ventures, JLA Ventures, and Desjardins Venture Capital.”

Along with closing this funding round, Tungle also unveiled the beta version of its free, next-generation web scheduling service. It allows users to dynamically propose times to meet with one or many people.  Tungle also allows its customers to securely share their free/busy calendar across company boundaries with any other Tungle user.  It is the first to work with Outlook—with or without Microsoft Exchange, Google Calendar, Apple iCal, Entourage for Mac, or on its own.  People can go to the Tungle website at www.tungle.com and start using the beta version of Tungle right away.  No registration or download is required to try out the service.

 “Tungle addresses a significant pain for all busy professionals,” said Jeffrey Hurst, general partner with Commonwealth Capital Ventures. “The Tungle team has the experience and drive to capitalize on this opportunity and revolutionize the online scheduling and groupware market.”

Jeff Hurst will join Marc Gingras; Pierre Donaldson, partner with JLA Ventures and the BlackBerry Partners Fund;  Daniel Boisvert, chief executive officer of Strategika International; and Stephane Marceau, president of IPEXA Development, on Tungle’s Board of Directors.

Tungle’s service is based on proprietary algorithms that assure that Tungle customers will never be double booked as their availability changes. As blocks of times are proposed for a meeting, they are dynamically updated with the latest availability of the organizer, and with the other Tungle customers that have responded to the meeting invitation.  Once the meeting is booked, the organizer’s calendar is automatically updated, and each invitee will receive a meeting invitation formatted for their specific calendar application.

In addition to being accessible from any browser, Tungle is optimized for all mobile environments.  Professionals on the move – checking email on their BlackBerry, iPhone or any other smartphone –  can respond to a Tungle meeting invitation via a link. A click on that link launches a smartphone browsing session, formatted for each device’s display.  No download or registration is required.

About Tungle

Founded in 2006, Tungle is the ultimate scheduling service. Tungle is a free web-based scheduling service that extends its customers’ time management and groupware solutions, making it easy to coordinate meetings with other professionals no matter where they are or what time management software or groupware application they use. For more information about Tungle visit www.tungle.com

About Commonwealth Capital Ventures

Commonwealth Capital Ventures (Waltham, MA) is a venture capital firm focused on software and services, Internet and digital media, communications and wireless, and instruments and systems investments. The firm’s collaborative investment approach leverages the entire team’s venture and operating expertise, experience, and contacts to guide portfolio companies through all stages of their development.  Since its inception in 1995, Commonwealth has invested in over 140 high-growth companies.  Commonwealth currently manages more than $580 million of committed capital across four funds.  For more information, please visit www.commonwealthvc.com.