Quickly growing CodeBaby adds customers, employees
CodeBaby Corp. has more tripled its customer base and staff in the past year and plans to double its current staff by year’s end to support growing sales of its digital interactive characters, the company’s CEO said Wednesday.
The Colorado Springs-based startup also has hired technology industry veteran Dennis McGuire as its chief operating officer as the first step in filling out its management team in the next few weeks with a chief financial officer and marketing executive, said CEO Patrick Bultema. The company has expanded its staff to 45 from 15 a year ago and plans to employ 100 by year’s end to keep up with customer demand for its characters, he said.
“Our (order) bookings are growing at a 200 to 300 percent rate. We are adding multiple customers each week, and because we have had so much success with customers, it is time to start adding talent to the customer-facing side of the business,” Bultema said.
CodeBaby has boosted its customer roster to more than 200 from 75 a year ago, adding Taco Bell and its corporate parent Yum! Brands as national accounts and several local companies and agencies.
Both Taco Bell and Yum! Brands use CodeBaby’s characters to train new workers at restaurants. Pikes Peak Community College uses one of the company’s characters to help prospective students fill out its application and the Colorado Springs Police uses a character to help guide citizens through forms to report a crime. Other well-known customers include computer peripheral maker Logitech and ContentWatch, developer of online-filtering software Net Nanny.
CodeBaby’s board, including electronic game developer BioWare founders Greg Zeschuk and Ray Muzyka, recently pumped additional funding into the company, but Bultema said he plans to seek up to $5 million in venture capital this spring or summer.
Bultema said McGuire will supervise all of CodeBaby’s “customer-facing” operations, including marketing, sales, service and support, while Bultema will handle strategic partnerships, investor relations and some key accounts. Bultema said the company spent the past four months seeking a chief operating officer before hiring McGuire, who was a consultant for 1½ years after spending two years as vice president of Star B2B, a unit of advertising giant Omnicom Group.
A longtime Colorado Springs resident, McGuire also was vice president and general manager at Protocol Marketing, a founding partner and general manager at Saligent and held executive posts at Current and United Technologies.
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