TestGorilla secures $70m in Series A

As companies continue to struggle with recruitment due to post-COVID-19 resignations – dubbed the ‘Great Resignation‘ – technology leaders are emerging, seeking to streamline and better personalize the recruitment and hiring process.

Amsterdam-based TestGorilla, an online skills-assessment platform that launched in the summer of 2020, has just secured $70 million in Series A funding, backed by venture capital firms Balderton and Atomico. 

The startup’s business model is gaining momentum, as in the few short years since its launch, it has garnered $80 million total investment and over 5,000 customers, including Sony, PepsiCo, Bain & Company, Oracle, Revolut, H&M, and the UK’s National Health Service. 

TestGorilla’s strategy distinguishes the company among other hiring programs, as the software seeks to eliminate hiring biases by evaluating applicants based on their skills rather than mere CV line items.

“Our portfolio companies hire more than 10,000 people a year and across the board, they have been looking for ways to remove bias while giving candidates the best hiring experience. It’s clear that traditional hiring practices have failed on both these fronts, and that this has only been exacerbated by Covid-19 and the rise of remote hiring,” says James Wise, a partner at Balderton Capital. 

TestGorilla was founded by entrepreneur Wouter Durville and a former Bain & Company partner Otto Verhage in an effort to make the hiring process more efficient and more equitable.

“Too often, the recruitment process requires hiring managers to spend hours screening unreliable, incomplete, subjective CVs,” noted Durville.

“By replacing resumes with more than 220 scientifically validated tests, our platform helps to eliminate hiring bias, creating a level playing field where every candidate can compete on equal terms.”

How does TestGorilla work?

TestGorilla claims that the results of its screening tests outweigh the information that hiring managers get from traditional CVs during the application and recruitment process.

The platform features 225 tests to evaluate candidates for job-specific skills, general skills, as well as personalities and values.

For example, TestGorilla’s most popular examinations allow companies to assess whether a candidate’s values and behaviors align with those of the company, whether a candidate has strong attention to detail, and whether they know how to effectively analyze data.

 Such skills are difficult for candidates to convey in the written form on their CVs; thus, TestGorilla allows employers and their candidates to overcome the subliminal biases that can be connected to the hiring process. 

What will this investment do?

TestGorilla has clearly taken advantage of these trends in recruitment, as it has attracted more than 5,000 customers.

It plans on using this new funding to continue the development of the platform’s integration with more Applicant Tracking Systems (ATS).

They aim to connect existing ATS systems with the program and expand the current test library.

As the impetus toward skills-based hiring gains momentum, TestGorilla’s growth appears to be on track. This will not be the last we’ll hear of the Dutch HR startup.