Noam Topaz

Topaz Bridge is running counter to just about every economic trend imaginable. It's hiring (The Bellevue company plans to double the 30 person workforce by June.) It's adding customers. (Merck recently announced plans to roll out the software.) And it's raising capital. (An undisclosed investor just pumped $2 million into Topaz Bridge as part of a $5 million to $10 million venture round.) What's the secret sauce behind this 2-year-old company created by former Microsoft veteran Noam Topaz?

Quite simply, it helps large corporations reduce costs and save money. Or, in the words of vice president of marketing Cornelius Willis, it allows them to make "workforce optimization decisions." That's another phrase for layoffs. And I don't have to tell you that there are a lot of companies evaluating those these days. 

"We are really a critical part of how companies are responding to the challenging economic times, and I think that is stimulating interest in the company," said Willis.

Topaz Bridge has developed software that essentially turns over some of the heavy-lifting HR business functions to the staffers themselves. And it offers insights to corporations about internal processes. It does this by integrating SAP and Microsoft Office SharePoint, a service that is similar in some ways to the SAP-Microsoft joint venture known as Duet.

By handing over the responsibilities to employees, Willis said that companies can reduce the $20 to $30 it costs each time an employee calls a customer support line with a question. "It is very, very expensive for these large organizations to deliver these HR business processes to the employees, so we deliver that as a self-service front end,"  he said.  

It may seem odd for employees to manage their own HR information. After all, what's stopping someone from simply adjusting their salary by 15 percent or adding an extra two weeks of vacation pay? But Topaz said the system is secure, riding on the internal governance controls of SAP.  In that regard, he compares it to online banking.

"With online banking there are many things you can do, but you can't deposit more money to it," he said. It's a bit like Concur, the Redmond software company that allows employees to input their own travel and entertainment expenses. And while the two companies could compete in that arena, Topaz Bridge is tied directly into the SAP back-end.

"We are kind of standing on the shoulders of giants," said Topaz, who previously spent a decade at Microsoft helping to build the Duet product. Because of the competing interests of SAP and Microsoft, Topaz said he recognized an opportunity for a startup company to emerge. 

"There is a lot of pressure from both sides to meet somewhere in the middle and there is less concern for the needs of the customer," he said.

Topaz Bridge announced a multi-million dollar contract last month with Merck, the pharmaceutical giant with about 60,000 employees in 84 offices worldwide. As part of that deal, Merck employees will be able to input their own benefits and other employee information into a SAP-based HR system. The service contract as part of the deal runs for five years, Willis said.

As soon as Topaz Bridge announced Merck, it received inquiries from other corporations. It now has more than a dozen possible customers in the pipeline, some of Merck's size and others that are larger.

Founded in 2007, the company previously raised $1.5 million in angel financing. It plans to have the majority of the series B round closed in a few months. Vic Chynoweth, senior vice president and chief financial officer at Topaz Bridge, said the financing efforts are proceeding very well.

"It has been smooth so far, quite frankly," said Chynoweth, adding that they have already received commitments for about $5 million. "We will see how it goes over the next month or two to finish out the round."

It plans to use the funds to grow the sales and marketing staff, as well as to open facilities on the East Coast and Europe. In addition to its 30 full time staffers, Topaz Bridge employees 50 contractors. That includes a large offshore development team in India.

"We have an aggressive hiring plan," said Topaz. "We plan to grow our full-time staff rapidly. We are benefiting also from the economy. There are a lot of good people looking for jobs."