Check out the 10-slide pitch deck Circular, a recruitment startup inspired by the way VCs share talent among portfolio companies, used to raise $7.5 million


Circular cofounders Pedro Torrecillas, CEO, and Teo Ruiz, CTO

  • A startup inspired by the way VCs help portfolio startups share talent just raised $7.5 million.
  • Spain-based Circular runs an invite-only marketplace for internal recruiters to recommend candidates. 
  • Insider got an exclusive look at the 10-slide pitch deck it used to convince investors. 

Circular, an invite-only recruitment platform inspired by how venture capitalists recommend talent to portfolio companies, has just landed a $7.5 million Series A.

When a company posts a job and goes through the recruitment process it is often left with impressive candidates who ultimately missed out on the opportunity. It is here where Madrid-based Circular comes into play.

The recruiting company can then invite the unsuccessful candidate to Circular, a closed recruitment app that was founded in 2019. The startup counts jobseekers as vetted and recommended by the first company when they sign up, and connects them to internal recruiters from other companies with open posts.

Cofounders Pedro Torrecillas, CEO, and Teo Ruiz, CTO, had the idea while doing consultancy work for venture capital firms where they saw investors recommend talent to portfolio companies after coming runner-up for another job.

“There was this idea that when you end up hiring one candidate, you meet great people along the way,” Torrecillas told Insider. Venture capitalists were trying to utilize their private talent pool and portfolio companies would share talent, he said.

“What if we make this an industry-wide thing? What if every company shares the talent that they like? It will help candidates and it will help companies,” Torrecillas added. “We saw the potential for the transformation of the industry, and we just jumped into it.”

The 40-person strong startup formalizes what recruiters have been doing within their networks for years, the cofounders said. Collaboration results in faster hiring and improves candidate experience, they added. 

It comes as millions are quitting their jobs amid the pandemic-fueled Great Resignation, labor shortage, and the shift towards green jobs. 

Circular’s sweet spot is startups like itself, who the cofounders said are more likely to take a bet on a new system. The company does have some larger clients on board, such as cloud payment platform FORM3, estate agents Nested, and Dow Jones.

“We are seeing that larger companies are even more concerned about candidate experience,” Torrecillas said. “It’s a huge asset for them. They may seem reluctant to share in some cases but our intuition is that candidate experience can be a huge thing for companies.”

The Circular cofounder said that a bad interview process can “actually hit” the profit and loss accounts of larger businesses.

“Employer branding, candidate experience, and, more and more, competitive employee branding is a huge incentive to be part of this collaborative network,” he said.

Circular hopes to disrupt the recruitment industry to the same level as LinkedIn, which has otherwise “been the same 150 years.”

The fresh funds come as Circular launches in London and build out its European presence outside of Madrid and Barcelona. Companies on the hunt for remote employees can also tap into the network, which allows remote job postings across the continent. Torrecillas and Ruiz are eyeing Paris and Berlin as their next target markets. 

The round was led by Kibo Ventures, which has backed e-scooter company Tier, with participation from London-based LocalGlobe, B2B marketplace investor Point Nine, and others. It builds on a previously unannounced $2.5 million seed round bringing its total raised to $10 million. 

Check out the 10-slide redacted pitch deck the founders used to raise the newest round below:



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