Following Strategic Investment, Enterprise Software Maker Socialtext Joins Up With Peoplefluent

Social enterprise software maker Socialtext is today announcing having received strategic investment from Bedford Funding that will now see the service joining the Peoplefluent family of products. Bedford Funding, for those unaware, is a $1.4 billion tech investment fund and owner of Peoplefluent, the maker of Talent Management software for business customers.

Following the investment, Socialtext will be integrated into Peoplefluent’s own Human Capital Management (HCM) Suite, which focuses on offering tools to help companies recruit better. With the Socialtext integration, employees on the suite will be able to collaborate with each other and their greater enterprise, the company says.

Eugene Lee, Socialtext CEO, will remain CEO of Socialtext but will now report directly to Peoplefluent Chairman and CEO Charles S. Jones.

Founded in 2002, Socialtext was an early player in the social enterprise space, offering a number of products including a Yammer-like microblogging service, blogs, wikis, social profiles and spreadsheets. The company’s software has been offered both as a cloud service as well as an on-site appliance-based solution, and supports integration with traditional systems in the CRM and ERP space. To date, over 6,500 businesses have signed up for Socialtext, including Egon Zehnder, Getty Images, Symantec, Meredith Corporation, NYU Stern, OSIsoft, and Epitaph Records.

Peoplefluent, meanwhile, now supports over 5,100 organizations ranging from SMB shops to global corporations. The company today has 5 million users in 214 countries worldwide.

Since Socialtext is a private company, it chose to not disclose the terms of the deal. The company, however, had previously raised $19.4 million in funding from angels and VCs, including Draper Fisher Jurvetson.

As for why Socialtext is making the shift to join forces with Peoplefluent? The company says it was the right move in terms of being able to further grow the business. And for Peoplefluent, the investment was just a fit, says Mr. Jones. “We are investing in Socialtext to help solidify its leadership position in enterprise social software. Our recent strategies have focused on creating solutions for our customers that enable greater employee engagement and collaboration across the enterprise,” he says.

Both companies say they share a vision for a fully connected internal knowledge sharing network, and Bedford Funding saw this as a strategic investment that will help Peoplefluent fulfill its mobile social collaboration strategy in particular.

Socialtext will continue to operate under its brand name, and existing customers should not be impacted by the deal, the company reports.