Showpad
Founded by PJ Bouten, Louis Jonckheere, and Peter Minne in Ghent, Showpad became one of the early breakout SaaS companies in the Belgian ecosystem. The platform enables sales and marketing teams to align on content, equip reps with the right materials, and track engagement throughout the sales process.
Showpad raised substantial venture funding and expanded its US presence significantly, with dual headquarters in Ghent and Chicago. The company competes in the sales enablement category alongside Seismic and Highspot. Total lifetime funding reached $188M.
In August 2025, Vector Capital, a US private equity firm, acquired Showpad and merged it with Bigtincan, an Australian sales enablement platform. At the time of acquisition, Showpad reported EUR 160M in ARR and approximately 600 employees, with 120 based in Ghent.
Showpad is a key reference company in the Ghent ecosystem narrative and a proof point for B2B SaaS scaling out of Belgium.
Funding History
- Showpad Acquisition 2025 - Acquired by Vector Capital, merged with Bigtincan (Aug 2025)
Stated facts & numbers
- In 2013 Showpad's €1 million funding round was almost national news in Belgium. (0:11:09, Ben's Mentors 2026-03-20)
- Roeland Delrue worked nearly eight years at Showpad before co-founding Aikido; Jonckheere hired him in San Francisco ~11 years ago. (0:04:05, Ben's Mentors 2026-02-04)
- Showpad grew from 50 to 200 employees in about a year and a half. (0:47:21, Ben's Mentors 2026-02-04)
- Showpad was valued around €160-170 million at exit, at much lower multiples than AI-era startups like Aikido. (1:23:29, Ben's Mentors 2026-02-04)
- Around 24 startups have been founded by Showpad founders or early senior employees. (1:01:03, Ben's Mentors 2026-02-04)
- Cameron Deatsch, later CRO of Atlassian (grew it from 100 million to 5 billion), was Showpad's first American buyer at Jive; he speaks at Wintercircus on February 10. (0:58:00, Ben's Mentors 2026-02-04)
- Jonckheere founded Showpad and In The Pocket at around age 25 and is now 41. (0:44:48, Ben's Mentors 2026-02-04)
- Showpad does roughly $100 million in annual revenue. (0:33:23, Ben's Mentors 2024-09-11)
