VirgilHR, which has built SaaS technology to help companies comply with employment and labor laws, has closed on $1.5 million in pre-seed funding led by Squadra Ventures, Techstars, SHRMLabs and TEDCO.
The Gaithersburg, Md., firm, founded in 2021, runs a web portal, along with a chatbot, that provides real-time guidance to HR professionals on meeting regulatory requirements.
“Complying with thousands of ever-changing federal, state, and local employment and labor laws has been an impossible task — but it doesn’t have to be anymore,” said VirgilHR founder and CEO Jocelyn King, who previously worked at Target. “HR teams need to be in the know, without burdened by endless research. With VirgilHR, we help HR teams automate this process, reduce the need for research, and, in many cases, the need to speak with an attorney.”
Baltimore-based Squadra’s chief operating officer, Margaret Roth Fazlon, called King a “magnetic” founder whose “experience in the field has enabled her to develop a compelling product.”
Squadra has raised $37.6 million from two funds, and made nine portfolio investments while exiting one. Its recent investments include Overwatch Imaging, Instant Teams and Shift5. According to the firm’s managing partner, Guy Filippelli, its investment thesis is not regionally bound, but Baltimore still is “our hometown, our headquarters, and our community.” Squadra Ventures has an ongoing partnership with Innovation Works to provide mentorship to entrepreneurs and deliver new training, development, and engagement programs. Fazlon has been an executive mentor for IW and serves on the Innovation Works Advisory Board.
The Maryland Technology Development Corporation (TEDCO) runs seven different programs to fuel entrepreneurship across the state. They are: Venture Funds, Seed Investment Funds, Federal programs, Maryland Innovation Initiative Fund, Maryland Stem Cell Research Fund, Rural Business Innovation Initiative Fund and Social Impact Funds. Since 1998, TEDCO’s portfolio firms have generated more than 10,000 jobs, and made an economic impact estimated at $2.3 billion. Its portfolio companies have also contributed over $100 million in direct state and local revenue. TEDCO’s recent investments include Foretrace, SeeTrue, Linshom Medical, Warrior Centric Health and Givhero.
For the past two years, TEDCO has been led by executive director and CEO Troy LeMaile-Stovall, a 25-year veteran with experience in investment management, higher education, telecommunications, information technology and management consulting.
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To an HR professional, there is nothing more frustrating than Googling requirements and never feeling like you have enough information to make the right decision, Jocelyn King asserts. This observation set the stage for VirgilHR. “I would watch my team spend hours doing this and hear the same frustration from colleagues and peers over and over again,” she recalled.
King’s career in human relations include stints at Target, Ocado Group and Cybrary. She received a bachelor’s degree in Liberal Studies from Georgetown University and certification from SHRM-SCP. At VirgilHR, King has built a proprietary database of employment and labor law requirements that are regularly updated. This, King believes, provides “real-time, prescriptive guidance across federal, state, and local employment and labor laws.” The platform includes compliance guidance modules and content around leave, wage and hour, EEO, ADA and Pay Equity, and keeps adding knowledge.
“VirgilHR is intelligently applying technology to offer agency to HR teams and employees, improving the employment environment for all stakeholders,” said Taylor McLemore, managing director at Techstars, where the startup took part in an accelerator program. VirgilHR is due to graduate from the workforce accelerator program on Wednesday.
