Human resources and payroll platform company Deel Inc. announced today that it has raised $300 million in new funding on a $17.3 billion valuation.

The money will be used to accelerate strategic acquisitions, expand its native payroll infrastructure to more than 100 countries by 2029, and advance artificial intelligence-driven automation across its HR and payroll platform.

Founded in 2019, Deel offers a unified platform to help businesses hire, manage and pay employees and contractors across national borders. The platform is designed to simplify the legal, tax and payroll challenges that arise when companies operate globally.

Core to the company’s offering is support for global payroll and payments, with the platform allowing companies to run payroll across multiple countries while handling the complexities of local tax withholding, currency conversion and regulatory compliance.

Deel uses a mix of its own in-house payroll infrastructure and local in-country partners to ensure accuracy and legal compliance, with employers who use Deel able to issue paychecks or transfers in local currencies, manage payment cycles and integrate with accounting or enterprise resource planning systems.

Along with payroll, Deel also offers a range of HR, compliance and workforce management tools, with the platform supporting contract generation, compliance monitoring, onboarding/offboarding, time tracking, benefits administration and performance management all, from the one interface.

Deel continuously updates its systems to reflect changes in labor laws, tax rules and regulatory requirements in different jurisdictions to minimize risk for global employers and help them scale more smoothly across multiple countries.

The company also acts as an employer of record when a client company doesn’t have a local legal entity in a country. Deel becomes the employer on paper, handling local employment contracts, payroll, benefits, compliance and termination in compliance with local law.

Deel has seen strong growth, with September marking its third straight year of profitability and its first $100 million revenue month. Earlier this year, the company surpassed $1 billion in annual recurring revenue off the back of serving more than 37,000 businesses and 1.5 million workers across more than 150 countries processing $22 billion in payroll annually.

Notable Deel customers include Shopify Inc., Instacart, Klarna Bank AB, Jelly Belly Candy Co. and Reddit Inc.

The strategic investment round was led by Rabbit Capital, Andreessen Horowitz and Coatue Management, with General Catalyst Group Management and Green Bay Ventures also participating.

“This round is about doubling down on the global payroll infrastructure we’ve built from the ground up,” said co-founder and Chief Executive Alex Bouaziz. “We’re reimagining how payroll should work for the next century – fluid, real-time and truly borderless – and continuing our mission to become the single platform where companies can build, manage and pay their teams anywhere in the world.”

Image: Deel