New Venture Accelerator-mentored startup, 2019 Tiger Cage winner Flashtract acquired by Trimble Inc.

Transaction enables Flashtract to accelerate its already stellar growth while rewarding company founders, employees and investors alike

When Flashtract, one of the New Venture Accelerator’s flagship start-up companies, was acquired by Trimble Inc. earlier this month, the transaction was seen as a defining moment in a journey that began back in 2018 when Flashtract was one of only three start-ups working out of the original accelerator in Auburn University’s Research Park.

Defining moment, yes, but in another sense, this move was simply the next smart decision made by Flashtract co-founders Blair Chenault and Ben Conry as they continue to drive the success of the value-added payments platform they’ve created for the construction industry.

Chenault, Conry and the Flashtract team will be staying on as the company now becomes a part of Trimble Inc., a world leader in enterprise resource planning (ERP) software and related business technology solutions.

• The entire team will remain working in their same offices in Atlanta, Georgia.
• Flashtract’s proprietary technology, now branded as Trimble Pay, will be integrated within the capabilities of the Trimble Viewpoint® Vista™ ERP solution for construction applications.
• The acquisition “extends the robust connected construction technology ecosystem that Trimble Construction One brings to market,” according to Trimble’s press release.

Auburn’s New Venture Accelerator sat down with Chenault and Entrepreneur-in-Residence Scott McGlon to mark this latest move in Flashtract’s successful transformation from an initial idea into the powerhouse it has become. The two also commented on what’s next for Flashtract’s founders, the team and the $3 billion multinational publicly held company that acquired them.

How It All Began

Flashtract entered the Tiger Cage competition in 2018 but was eliminated in the quarterfinals, much to the disappointment of Chenault and Conry. McGlon notes that this initial failure marked a turning point in Flashtract’s development as well as a critical step in the growth of Chenault as an entrepreneur.

“Blair called me around 10 pm right after getting eliminated from their first Tiger Cage competition,” says McGlon,” and I could tell he was pretty upset. As I look back on that call, it became clear right then and there that Blair was truly committed to making Flashtract a success – one way or another. It seemed to me that this initial defeat put a major chip on his shoulder to succeed. That conversation was the reason I personally became one of Flashtract’s first investors.”

“Having a chip on one’s shoulder, being driven to succeed no matter what challenges are in front of you, is a key characteristic of successful entrepreneurial teams,” noted McGlon. “In my opinion, that trait is much more crucial to investors than the original idea itself. I knew Blair and Ben would be successful. It was just a matter of time and in which direction they would ultimately take the company.”

Flashtract’s market-proven technology is used to electronically manage payment applications, lien waivers and other compliance and billing documentation for leading construction industry players, eliminating the often-frustrating back-and-forth communication and cumbersome document transfer processes of old.

“We have earned a strong reputation for enabling general contractors to minimize legal and financial risk and improve efficiency since introducing our technology in 2019,” said Blair Chenault, co-founder and CEO of Flashtract, in the new parent company’s announcement. “Joining Trimble will allow our teams to further advance these capabilities and help contractors make payments on time and keep management of financial and compliance documents from hampering project delivery.”

People Matter – A Lot

A well-known adage of new venture funding is that investors invest in people, not products or technology. One of the most common reasons given when new ventures don’t get funded is: “Great product, cool technology, promising market – wrong team.”

“Yes, we were very disappointed at not even making it through the quarterfinals of our first Tiger Cage,” says Chenault, “but we were determined to do better. We spent the next year working with the New Venture Accelerator and Scott to focus our strategy, better define our target market, develop our product line and – especially work on the pitch process and our presentation.

That clearly was time well-spent, since we won Tiger Cage the following year while also sweeping all categories in that year’s Alabama Launchpad competition.”

The Momentum Grows

Drawing from their pitch competition winnings, Chenault and his team set out to put into place the core components of an ongoing business – hiring key staff, expanding their sales reach and preparing for securing the next stage funding they would need to continue on their fast-growth track.

One milestone in that effort was the company’s closing of $15 million in Series A funding in January 2022 led by Addition and Shine Capital, resources that helped Flashtract accelerate the growth of its team, rapidly scale its network of new contractors and cement its position as the industry standard for sending and receiving payments across its connected ecosystem.

According to Lee Fixel of Addition at the time, “We are impressed by Flashtract’s significant growth, and we look forward to supporting the company as it continues to solidify its position as the billing solution of choice for the construction space.”

That position as the industry leader in a new, vastly under-addressed market space propelled Flashtract to even greater growth and market expansion, which raised their visibility across the industry, including from Trimble.

“Trimble is a huge publicly traded international company, with customers and offices around the world,” says Chenault. “That was important, of course. But the really critical factor in considering them as a partner and now employer is that our product integrates with one of their ERP systems and the fact that our best customers are their customers, too.”

That synergy goes further than mere alignment of customers in the construction market, notes Chenault. “When you look at their product portfolio, you will see that they address a whole host of financial challenges that reside under the office of the Chief Financial Officer – ERP, HR, payroll, time tracking, etc. – but they had a gap when it comes to helping general contractors pay subcontractors. That’s where our software comes in.”

The Way Forward

Chenault, Conry and the entire Flashtract team are already moving full speed ahead when it comes to the integration process at Trimble.

“I’m coming in as the Director of Payments, with our primary focus set on driving the integration period, where we’ll be working to merge the two companies and the two product lines in the construction space,” notes Chenault. “There’s so much opportunity to leverage the synergies we already see – it’s exciting!”

None of this comes as a surprise to McGlon.

“In the ten years I’ve had the privilege of being a part of Auburn‘s entrepreneurship program, Flashtract stands out as one of the judges’ favorites,” says McGlon. “The company’s distinctive and compelling business model caught the interest of judges and investors at virtually every stage of Flashtract’s growth.”

As Flashtract’s first business mentor, McGlon witnessed firsthand the company’s confident evolution. “Even after their friends and family pre-seed round was closed, it was amazing to watch the interest from additional early-stage investors continue to come in. Rarely do you see 100% interest from every investor they reached out to, let alone the jockeying for opportunity to be involved with such a young startup from Auburn University.”

Unfinished Business

Despite the undeniable success they and their company have achieved, Chenault and Conry see this as a move that will propel their efforts forward at a more rapid pace.

“I think Ben and I look at it all from the perspective of ‘the job is not yet done.’ Yes, we could have taken our solution into the hands of a lot of people on our own, but we’ll now have a much broader platform to leverage in doing that. We now have the resources to take this to the next level.”

“The biggest thing that I want to convey is this is not the end of the road – simply the beginning of a new road for all of us. The ability to build off the payments functionality we’ve created by working hand-in-hand with a world class company like Trimble is huge for us.”

Chenault is also looking forward to giving back to the New Venture Accelerator where Flashtract’s journey began.

“I’d like to get more involved with the NVA now that we’ve come full cycle,” he noted. “We owe a lot of our success to the NVA program, and we’ve learned a few things along the way that might be helpful for some of the younger companies.”

Stay tuned.

To learn more about the New Venture Accelerator contact Scott McGlon at sem0094@auburn.edu