Khosla Ventures Invests $ 5 Mn In Wearable Device Maker Theatro In Series A

Theatro, a US and Bangalore based voice controlled wearable communications device maker for hourly workers in the retail, hospitality and manufacturing market segments, has raised $5 Mn investment in Series A round led by Khosla Ventures.  With this round, total funds raised by Theatro has reached to $8.8 Mn.  Ben Ling, investment partner at Khosla Ventures, has joined Theatro’s board of directors, as a part of deal. 

The funds will be used to help Theatro aggressively expand its sales and marketing efforts as well as broaden and accelerate product innovation. 

“Improving workforce productivity and customer satisfaction is at the heart of Theatro’s suite of products and is a major challenge for most retailers,” said Ling. “We are excited to work with Theatro during their next phase of growth as they roll out the service to retailers across the nation.”

Theatro has developed a voice-enabled enterprise wearable coupled with a software suite of productivity applications for brick and mortar retail, hospitality and manufacturing enterprises.  Its “Heads-Up and Hands Free” mobile communications and management solution, delivered over the in-store WiFi to every hourly employee, basically a solution for the on the move workforce. It provides management unprecedented insights to increase sales associate productivity, conversion rates and store profitability while enabeling hourly employees access to the information they need to provide a new level of customer service.  

“Hourly employees are one of today’s most valuable workforces, and they could be more effective and productive with innovative technology tools available to them,” said Chris Todd, Theatro CEO.  “Ben Ling and Khosla Ventures share our vision of the prominent impact that enhanced enterprise communications can have on mobile workforces by connecting employees to one another while they’re on the job and also to their company’s business information.  We are very excited to be teaming with KV as we redefine the future of this important and growing workforce”.

Theatro was founded in 2012 by Chris Todd, Ravi Shankar Kumar, Patrick Fitzgerald and Guy VanBuskirk, it is headquartered in Dallas and has opened a research and development (R&D) center in Bangalore, in February this year. 

This year a number of funding activity has taken place in the wearable device segment which includes recent funding of GOQii, Fin.