Australian event technology startup Circolo Software has secured strategic backing from simPRO Software founder Stephen Bradshaw and former senior executive Jonathan Eastgate as part of its latest funding round.
The funding round was completed following the launch of Circolo Ticketing, the company’s integrated event ticketing and registration platform.
Circolo has now raised more than $300,000 in pre-seed capital this year and plans to undertake a larger capital raise later this year to accelerate product development, expand its team and support national and international growth initiatives.
Circolo was founded by former simPRO executive Vanessa Winter and is building an all-in-one event operations platform designed to simplify the planning, coordination and delivery of events.
The investment from Mr Bradshaw, who founded simPRO in 2002, and Mr Eastgate, simPRO’s former Chief Operating Officer, represents a significant endorsement of Circolo’s growth strategy and product direction.
Both investors played key roles in simPRO’s international expansion before its acquisition by the global private equity firm K1 Investment Management in 2021, at a valuation exceeding $1 billion.
The company’s latest product launch expands the platform’s capabilities beyond event management workflows to include fully integrated ticketing, registration, guest management and event check-in functionality.
Ms Winter said the launch of Circolo Ticketing marked a major milestone for the business and reinforced the company’s vision of creating a unified operating system for event professionals.
“Most event businesses are still forced to juggle disconnected platforms for ticketing, guest management, budgets, communication and event delivery,” Ms Winter said.
“With Circolo Ticketing, we’ve brought those workflows together into one connected workspace. Event teams can now sell tickets, manage registrations, coordinate suppliers and run events from a single platform without duplicating information across multiple systems.”
“Having Steve and Jonathan support the business at this stage is incredibly exciting. They’ve built and scaled one of Australia’s most successful SaaS companies and understand what it takes to create software that genuinely solves operational challenges.”
Circolo recently launched its ticketing platform in early access, allowing event organisers to create ticketed or RSVP-based events, manage capacities, process payments and track attendance in real time.
The company has also released a dedicated ticket scanning application designed to support fast event check-ins and live attendance tracking.
Mr Bradshaw said Circolo’s product vision stood out because it addressed operational inefficiencies across the entire event lifecycle rather than focusing solely on ticket sales.
“Vanessa and the team have identified a genuine gap in the market,” Mr Bradshaw said.
“Most ticketing platforms stop at the transaction. Circolo connects ticketing with the operational side of event delivery, which creates a much stronger and more scalable solution for event businesses.”
Mr Eastgate said Circolo’s integrated approach positioned the company strongly within a growing global events technology market.
“The complexity involved in delivering events continues to grow,” Mr Eastgate said.
“What impressed us was Circolo’s focus on simplifying collaboration, visibility and execution for event teams. The platform has significant potential as businesses increasingly look to consolidate fragmented systems.”
