[Software] Software developer assessment platform CodeSignal raises $50M in new funding

[Love Pulse]

 

Data-driven tech talent recruiting platform CodeSignal Inc. said today it has closed on a $50 million round of funding, bringing its total amount raised to $87.5 million.

Index Ventures led the Series C round with participation from Menlo Ventures, Headline and A Capital.

The company also announced the launch of an advanced integrated development environment that enables recruiters to assign more relevant assessment experiences to job candidates.

CodeSignal has created a cloud-based platform that companies looking to hire software developers expertise can use to assess candidates’ programming. For candidates, the platform provides a specialized code editor they can use to complete programming tests during the recruiting process. For the companies doing the recruiting, CodeSignal provides tools designed to reduce the amount of manual work required to assess job applicants' know-how.

The startup’s platform includes over 4,000 pre-packaged coding tasks that can be used to evaluate candidates’ familiarity with the various technical topics. Companies can also create their own custom tasks. After a candidate completes an assignment, automated algorithms assign a score to their project that allows recruiters to see how well the developer completed the task without having to manually evaluate their code.

Recruiters can also use CodeSignal to perform more thorough assessments of a developer’s familiarity with a given technology or programming language. CodeSignal offers a “replay” feature that makes it possible to view how a candidate went about solving a task for insight into their workflow. For a more technical look at a candidate's programming approach, tech-savvy recruiters can also pull up the coding errors that were generated while the developer was working on an assignment.

CodeSignal co-founder and Chief Executive Tigran Sloyan told SiliconANGLE the new IDE is meant to help companies create more realistic job assessments for candidates in late-stage interviews. He explained that while the company's existing General Coding Assessments are designed to measure core programming fundamentals and computer science knowledge, the IDE is more targeted, allowing recruiters to measure an applicant's ability to complete specific or unique tasks.

“If you think about assessing the skills of basketball players, GCA measures a player’s core skills such as their ability to run fast, jump high, et cetera,” Sloyan said. “The new IDE is an actual simulation of the entire game to evaluate skills in highly unique situations such as the ability to accelerate fast while doing a dummy move, then dodging a block and going for a slam dunk.”

Sloyan added that companies will now be able to use CodeSignal to deliver more relevant assessments for complex development and data roles.

“Employers can now assess full stack and other complex skills within a single coding task that supports a live frontend, filesystem, and terminal, all within a browser,” he continued. “This innovation is not only essential for hiring full-stack developers, it revolutionizes the cloud IDE to create the most realistic simulation of software engineering jobs that's available on the market.”

Analyst Holger Mueller of Constellation Research Inc. SiliconANGLE told the updates should be beneficial for both recruiters and applicants.

“Enterprises need to hire more developers in order to become and remain winners in digital transformation, and for that they need better hiring tools,” he said. “It’s good to see CodeSignal is stepping up its game, helping companies find qualified developers more easily, and giving developers a way to show off their true skills.”

CodeSignal claims some of the world's biggest technology firm among its customers, including Facebook Inc., Zoom Video Communications Inc. and the video game developer Roblox Corp.

“This funding will help accelerate our product and go-to-market functions to continue helping companies make data-driven hiring decisions, while creating a phenomenal candidate experience along the way,” Sloyan said.