Toronto Software Maker to Expand to Boston
Just three months after Newton venture capital firm GrandBanks Capital invested $5 million into it, a Toronto-based maker of web-based financial services software is planning to open its U.S. headquarters in Boston.
The software startup, First Coverage Inc., has appointed former Thomson Financial executive and GrandBanks Capital entrepreneur-in-residence Roland Beaulieu as president.
The appointment of Beaulieu reunites him with former Thomson Financial CEO Jeff Parker, who, as a founding partner of GrandBanks, was appointed chairman of First Coverage’s board upon the closing of the Series A funding.
The 25-person company is hoping its office in Boston will speed the process of bringing its buy-side/sell-side relationship-management software to U.S. clients. Initially, the office will support a handful of employees, and will be focused on the sales, marketing and support functions for domestic clients, according to Beaulieu.
Beaulieu spent 13 years at Thomson before leaving in 2000 to be the COO of Corporate Communications Broadcast Network Inc. (CCBN), which was acquired by Thomson Financial in 2004. CCBN created “StreetVision,” a corporate-reporting tool that became an industry standard for financial institutions.
First Coverage boasts a handful of U.S. clients, though officials would not disclose specifics. Its platform picks up where StreetVision left off, according to Beaulieu.
“It’s a way for buy-side managers to extend their relationships with sell-side managers and arrange information that is normally too dispersed to keep track of,” he said.
