Awardco, the Utah-based employee engagement and rewards platform, has secured $165 million in Series B funding, catapulting its valuation past $1 billion, and solidifying its unicorn status in HR tech. The round was led by Sixth Street Growth and Spectrum Equity, with extended support from General Catalyst and Ryan Smith (HXCO).

Founded by Steve Sonnenberg, Mike Sonnenberg, and Tanner Runia, Awardco enables companies - ranging from Adobe to AT&T - to embed employee recognition into everyday workflows while unlocking thousands of reward options worldwide. With over 6 million users in 163 countries and a catalogue of 300 million+ reward choices, Awardco has positioned itself as the backbone of culture-driven engagement.

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What Awardco Does

Awardco delivers a modular platform that helps companies design, deploy, and manage recognition, rewards, and engagement programs - all with no hidden fees or markup.

Key capabilities include:

• Configurable rewards marketplace integrated with Amazon Business
  
• Peer-to-peer recognition, milestone programs, and behavioral incentives
  
• Real-time integration with Slack, Teams, Outlook, and HRIS systems
  
• AI-powered analytics, employee insights, and automated nudges
  
• Audit-ready reporting and compliance across international markets
  

By combining flexibility, scale, and transparency, Awardco makes recognition not just possible, but strategic, measurable, and meaningful.

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Why This Changes the Game

The employee experience market is undergoing a systemic reset. In a world of distributed teams and rising turnover costs, the need to operationalize culture is no longer optional - it’s existential.

Awardco isn’t just a platform for perks. It’s a recognition operating system that embeds performance nudges, appreciation, and reward logic into daily workflows. The shift is subtle but monumental: from gesture-based HR tools to outcome-based engagement infrastructure.

And here’s what many founders overlook:

Recognition systems that succeed don’t just track activity - they guide behavior through micro-incentive design.

Awardco’s true moat isn’t just its reward marketplace - it’s the flywheel between data and decisions. By embedding feedback loops into the culture layer, they create systems that learn, adapt, and reward in real time.

If you’re building a product in the B2B SaaS space, especially anything that touches operations, performance, or people - you can’t just build for usability. You have to design for decision bandwidth. Awardco figured out how to make employee experience operationally scalable, which is what pushed investors to bet big on them.

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Market Outlook: Culture Tech at the Tipping Point

Recognition and engagement software is no longer a “nice-to-have” HR initiative - it's fast becoming critical infrastructure for workforce performance and retention.

• The global employee recognition systems market is projected to reach $30.8 billion by 2030, up from $10.6 billion in 2023, growing at a CAGR of 16.8% (Allied Market Research)
  
• According to Gallup, only 23% of global employees feel engaged at work, and disengaged employees cost companies $8.8 trillion in lost productivity annually
  
• A recent Deloitte survey found that companies with highly effective recognition programs have 31% lower voluntary turnover
  
• 82% of HR leaders in North America plan to increase investments in employee experience tech by 2026, with recognition software topping the list (PwC Future of Work)
  

Awardco is uniquely positioned in this ecosystem as an all-in-one, flexible solution that’s just as relevant for remote knowledge teams as it is for global frontline operations.

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What’s Next for Awardco

With fresh capital and unicorn status, Awardco is launching its next growth phase:

• Expanding into AI‑powered employee insights, predictive engagement, and performance automation
  
• Rolling out advanced HRIS integrations and deeper workflows in Slack, Teams, and Office365
  
• Scaling globally, with new infrastructure - like their London office - and planned expansion into Europe and Asia
  
• Evolving the platform into a unified employee experience system, spanning recognition, performance, wellness, and engagement
  

This is Act Two: transitioning from recognition to fluence - embedded culture systems that operate at scale and in context.

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Why This Moment Matters

Organizations used to think of recognition as nice-to-have. With Awardco, it’s now a strategic imperative - a way to operationalize belonging, loyalty, and alignment at global scale.

As hybrid work models persist and frontline needs become enterprise priorities, real-time recognition and culture-first incentives will be the difference between sticking employees and slipping ones.

Awardco is shaping that future - not just through features, but by embedding recognition into the nervous system of work.