Member Article

Groop (Formerly RunAClub) Secures £3 Million Investment to Drive Growth

Today, Groop, the trusted community management platform, announced that it has closed a £3M investment to accelerate its growth.

Groop build strong, safe and sustainable communities connecting people and empowering society. Due to the increase of compliance requirements and growing awareness by the public regarding data privacy and security, Groop is experiencing a dramatic increase for their secure club, group and community management tools.

Built for scale, Groop has the capacity to service a global population. With a goal of making a significant difference to communities and the fabric of our society - allowing everyone to belong and be inspired to take part, Groops’ users positively impact society’s wider issues of loneliness, poverty, mental health and obesity.

Formed in 2012, Groop has successfully built a loyal customer base and has supported 500,000 participations in community activity; recording over 279,000 volunteer hours through several charitable and public sector organisations such as The Royal Voluntary Service and Essex County Council; alongside independent clubs and societies. Groop are now helping to inform board strategy and corporate social responsibility with employee engagement programmes across sports, youth, community and health groups.

“With this investment, we are enhancing our platform to service all community groups from grassroots to national organisations across all sectors. To become the trusted, global Community Management Platform,” commented Sally Higham, Groop CEO & Founder. ’‘We’re enabling everyone, via our platform, to get started and more effectively run a club or group with all the complex issues of paperwork, legal requirements and data protection taken care of. Meaning, our customers can now focus on making an impact within their community, instantly – the Groop platform does this and so much more.”

A significant part of the investment has been made by Hartham Group set up by their CEO and serial entrepreneur Jeff Thomas. Hartham Group invests in companies that use technology to catalyse change in our connected society and promote a citizen centric data economy.

Jeff Thomas commented; ’We are living in a world of unprecedented change. We are witnessing a revolution founded on data, which will have a more profound change on individuals than any revolution that has come before. Data and Digital now mediate our interactions with others. It is critical that we embrace this change or get left behind. We must build a connected society that uses personal data responsibly to create economic and social value. Groop embraces all of our values. We have invested equity, and will continue to provide management experience and support to propel Groop into hyper growth.“

Sally commented that their investment partner has provided significant business, technology and strategic support in addition to the financial input, “Jeff is an extraordinary, insightful and creative individual who has championed Groop and the social impact we achieve. With his help, we will achieve the potential we always knew we could reach; creating meaningful social impact by helping communities support the next generation of people who care about each other.”

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Marc Duke .