A company worth over two billion dollars in less than a year … it started with 4 employees

Less than a year ago, the disease prompted a young Briton, Johnny Boufarhat, to seek out the use of the internet to organize virtual events rather than real events that he could not attend, so he created a company to organize virtual events and called it “Hopen”.

He didn’t know in the young investor’s mind that his startup would surpass $ 2 billion, less than a year after its founding, to become the fastest emerging company in history to grow at this rate at all, according to a report by the British newspaper “Financial Times”.

On Tuesday, the company raised around $ 125 million in its latest round of funding from prominent US investors, such as Tiger Global Fund and the IVP Foundation, after a fundraising round last June, in which it raised around $ 40 million, bringing the company’s value to around $ 2 billion at a time when it is expected to continue to accelerate. The growth of the company in the coming period.

The Corona pandemic has caused a drastic change in the business of the startup, after months of its creation earlier at the end of last year, its activity has accelerated sharply and the number of its employees has reached around 200 employees in 38 countries around the world because it organizes numerous events in which hundreds of thousands of users participate every week on the Internet.

“My goal has always been to be the fastest growing company in the world … It would be great if this company were based in Europe,” Boufarhat told the newspaper.

While companies on Zoom offer video conferencing services, the new UK startup is targeting all events, including exhibitions and presentation meetings.

It took Chinese company “Zoom” about 5 years to reach a valuation of around $ 1 billion, while company “Hobin” broke this barrier and became a billionaire “Unicorn” company in less than a year. year.