Khoros Acquisition, Valuation, Funding & Investors

Khoros was acquired by IgniteTech in May 2025.

Khoros acquisition price

Undisclosed

Acquired by IgniteTech · May 2025

Cumulative funding Khoros raised

$125M

across 4 funding rounds

Key investors in Khoros

  • InterWest Partners
  • OpenView
  • Austin Ventures
  • Lead Edge Capital
  • Greenspring Associates
  • Riverwood Capital
  • Silver Lake Waterman

Khoros Overview

About Khoros

Khoros is a customer engagement platform integrating community forums, messaging, and feedback tools for brands like Sephora, Lenovo, and Wayfair. Austin-headquartered since 2019 following Spredfast and Lithium merger, it processes millions of interactions daily to boost sales, loyalty, and product innovation through AI-moderated discussions.


Founded

2008

HQ

United StatesAustin, TX

Website

khoros.com

Status

Acquired

Customer focus

B2B

Revenue model

Subscription

Khoros Acquisition

Khoros was acquired by IgniteTech for an undisclosed price on 27 May 2025.

Before the acquisition Khoros had raised $125M across 4 funding rounds.

IgniteTech, an AI-first enterprise software company based in Austin, Texas, acquired Khoros, an award-winning platform for digital-first customer engagement, on May 27, 2025. Khoros enables complex brands to engage customers at scale across digital, social, and brand-owned channels for service, support, communications, and sales, powered by advanced automation and AI; it serves 2,000 reputable companies, including a third of the Fortune 100. The acquisition integrates IgniteTech's AI technologies into Khoros' Communities, Service, and Social Media Management products to counter AI answer engines challenging traditional communities, where non-AI brands face 40% drops in visibility and engagement. Strategic rationale centers on enhancing Khoros with AI features like AI Creator Intelligence System for 40-60% higher conversion rates in creator partnerships, AI Expert Help by mid-Q3 2025, AI Discovery Defender and AI Brand Defender in Q3-Q4 2025, and Brand Intelligence Suite for Service. IgniteTech, having transformed over 150 enterprise software companies and shifted to AI-first in under 10 months, plans to rebuild Khoros on its Aurora architecture for scalable AI integration, partnering with customers and hiring AI talent. Post-acquisition updates in July 2025 reaffirmed customer collaboration, community-led innovation, and continuity for legacy products like Classic Community. Deal terms remain undisclosed in announcements, but IgniteTech committed to immediate previews at ignitetech.ai/khoros, customer webinars, and roadmap calls via khoros@ignitetech.ai. Both companies are Austin-based, with Khoros led by CEO Chris Tranquill pre-acquisition and Eric Vaughan as CEO of IgniteTech and Khoros post-deal; Michael Puhala continues as Chief Community Evangelist.

Khoros acquisition details
AcquirerDateType
  • IgniteTech
27 May 2025Strategic M&A

Khoros Funding History

Khoros has raised a total of $125M across 4 funding rounds.

Khoros' first fundraising round was a $18M Series C in February 2013. The most recent completed round was a $50M Series F in June 2016.

Khoros funding rounds

Khoros funding rounds
DateStageInvestorsRaised
Jun 2016Series FRiverwood Capital (lead); OpenView; Lead Edge Capital; Austin Ventures; InterWest Partners$50M
Mar 2015Series ESilver Lake Waterman (lead)$24M
Jan 2014Series DLead Edge Capital (lead); OpenView; Austin Ventures; InterWest Partners$33M
Feb 2013Series COpenView (lead); Greenspring Associates; Austin Ventures; InterWest Partners$18M

Who has invested in Khoros?

7 investors have backed Khoros across its funding rounds, including InterWest Partners, OpenView, Austin Ventures, Lead Edge Capital, Greenspring Associates and Riverwood Capital.

Lead investors include Riverwood Capital, Silver Lake Waterman, Lead Edge Capital and OpenView.


Khoros Investors

Investors in Khoros by funding rounds participated
InvestorHQRoundsRoleFirst check
OpenViewUnited StatesBoston, MA3LeadFeb 2013
Austin VenturesUnited StatesAustin, TX3ParticipantFeb 2013
InterWest PartnersUnited StatesSan Francisco, CA3ParticipantFeb 2013
Lead Edge CapitalUnited StatesNew York City, NY2LeadJan 2014
Greenspring AssociatesUnited StatesBaltimore, MD1ParticipantFeb 2013

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Acquisitions by Khoros

Khoros has acquired 5 companies to date.

Last acquisition by Khoros was on January 28th 2021. Khoros acquired Flow.ai for undisclosed valuation.


Latest Acquisitions by Khoros

Flow.ai
Topbox
Lithium Technologies
Shoutlet
Description
Flow.ai is an Amsterdam-headquartered platform for building conversational AI agents, chatbots, and voice assistants. The no-code interface supports drag-and-drop flow builders with NLP powered by Dialogflow and custom models for 100+ languages. Flow.ai integrates with channels like WhatsApp, Facebook Messenger, and Slack, handing off complex queries to human agents via live chat routing. Used by enterprises in e-commerce and telecom, it processes millions of monthly conversations. Acquired by MessageBird in 2019, the platform emphasizes GDPR-compliant data handling.
Topbox analyzes customer feedback from voice calls, chats, texts, social media, NPS surveys, and reviews to pinpoint friction in interactions. The platform aggregates data across channels for enterprises, enabling rapid issue resolution. Used by brands in retail and tech, it processes millions of interactions monthly to improve customer experience metrics.
Lithium Technologies is a San Francisco-headquartered provider of community management software that powers customer engagement for global brands. The platform integrates social media monitoring, sentiment analysis, and response orchestration across forums, blogs, and networks. Clients including Sephora, HTC, and Air France leverage Lithium's tools to handle millions of interactions monthly, driving customer support, feedback collection, and advocacy programs. Acquired by Vista Equity Partners in 2017, the company processes data from over 100 communities worldwide.
-
HQ CountryNetherlandsUnited StatesUnited StatesUnited States
HQ City
Tilburg
Washington, DC
San Francisco, CA
-
Deal Date28 Jan 20214 Jan 20214 Sep 201819 Aug 2015
Valuationundisclosedundisclosedundisclosedundisclosed
EV/Revenue
EV/EBITDA

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Khoros Competitors

Khoros competitors include listed companies like Ooma and Sprout Social, and private ones like Datarails, Motion.io, UJET and Vapi.

Public and private companies comparable to Khoros
CompanyHQStatusRevenueEBITDAValuationRevenue Multiple
DatarailsUnited StatesUnited StatesPrivate$100M-$550M5.5x
Motion.ioUnited StatesBoulder, COPrivate$50M-$550M11.0x
UJETUnited StatesSan Francisco, CAPrivate--$500M-
VapiUnited StatesSan Francisco, CAPrivate$8M-$500M-
OomaUnited StatesUnited StatesPublicly listed$274M$19M$617M2.1x
Sprout SocialUnited StatesUnited StatesPublicly listed$458M($31M)$656M1.2x

Khoros Public Comps

Khoros is no longer listed, but its public comps include Ooma, Sprout Social, Consensus Cloud, Enghouse Systems, Tanla Platforms, Note Inc., Truecaller, Agora, Vercom and Route Mobile.

Last FYEV/RevenueEV/EBITDA
RevenueEBITDALast FYLTM2027ELast FYLTM2027E
Ooma$274M$19M2.4x2.1x35.5x15.4x
Sprout Social$458M($31M)1.3x1.2x(18.6x)8.1x
Consensus Cloud$350M$166M3.2x3.1x6.8x5.9x
Enghouse Systems$357M$87M1.4x1.4x5.6x5.6x
Tanla Platforms$461M$76M1.2x1.2x7.6x7.1x
Note Inc.$27M$2M12.4x12.6x187.1x166.2x
Truecaller$195M$61M3.2x3.4x10.2x11.8x
Agora$141M$3M0.7x0.6x35.2x1382.0x

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Common questions about Khoros

When was Khoros founded?Khoros was founded in 2008.
Where is Khoros headquartered?Khoros is headquartered in Austin, TX, United States.
Is Khoros publicly listed?No, Khoros was acquired by IgniteTech in May 2025.
Who acquired Khoros?Khoros was acquired by IgniteTech in May 2025.
How much funding has Khoros raised?Khoros has raised $125M across 4 funding rounds.
What was Khoros' last funding round?Khoros' last funding round was a $50M Series F in June 2016, led by Riverwood Capital.
Who are Khoros' investors?Khoros' investors include OpenView, Austin Ventures, InterWest Partners, Lead Edge Capital, Greenspring Associates, Riverwood Capital and Silver Lake Waterman.
Which companies are comparable to Khoros?Companies comparable to Khoros include Datarails, Motion.io, UJET, Vapi, Ooma and Sprout Social.
How many companies has Khoros acquired?Khoros has acquired 5 companies, including Flow.ai, Topbox, Lithium Technologies, Shoutlet and Mass Relevance.

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