Algolia Hires New CEO to Lead Next Stage of Company Growth

Bernadette Nixon Brings Proven Company-Building and Deep Go-to-Market Experience to High-Growth Search-as-a-Service Leader

Algolia, the leading Search and Discovery solution, announced the appointment of Bernadette Nixon as Chief Executive Officer (CEO). Nixon most recently served as CEO at Alfresco, where she led the open source content services provider in redefining its go-to-market strategy, launching strategic new products and building a world-class team to scale the company’s growth. Nixon will leverage this experience to guide Algolia through its next phase of growth, as it continues its mission to empower every company to deliver delightful and inspiring search and discovery experiences that drive business results. Nicolas Dessaigne, Algolia’s co-founder, will transition from the role of CEO and continue to serve as a board member.

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“Nicolas has built a world-class company powered by a team of search and customer experience experts that are a force to be reckoned with. Algolia’s product innovation, passionate customer base and top-tier investors all validate that,” said Bernadette Nixon, CEO, Algolia. “As digital usage accelerates, the need for fast, relevant and scalable search is increasing. Algolia is uniquely positioned to help customers with this problem through its platform for powering the entire search and browse experience. I look forward to applying my experience in scaling companies by fostering great relationships with employees, customers and partners, and taking Algolia to new heights.”

Before joining Alfresco, Nixon served as president of SDL plc—a global software and professional services company—after growing its sales team as chief revenue officer. Prior to SDL, she held positions at OpenText as general manager and senior vice president of its BPM Business Unit and Corporate Sales. Nixon was also executive vice president of sales for the Americas at Metastorm, and served in similar roles at CA Technologies, InterQuad and NCR. Nixon also held a position at the United Nations in Geneva, which today would be known as deputy CIO.

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“Since co-founding Algolia eight years ago with Julien Lemoine, our chief technology officer, we have worked to make Algolia a true search innovator and market leader. Our series C funding round completed in September 2019, and the trillion searches that our customers perform yearly from everywhere in the world underscore our strong growth,” said Dessaigne. “I have always been focused on building a great company and culture to ensure Algolia can reach its true potential, and believe that Bernadette’s experience and skill set will advance the company through its next stage of growth. Her track record of scaling companies is exactly what Algolia needs at this stage. I am extremely proud of this company and am pleased to pass the torch to Bernadette for this exciting new phase.”

Over the past year, Algolia has experienced tremendous growth, spanning e-commerce sites like Under Armour, Dunelm, The RealReal and ManoMano; media and streaming companies like Ouest-France and Dailymotion; and technology companies like Stripe and Slack. With over 9,000 companies using Algolia across 120 countries, Algolia’s platform will power over one trillion searches in 2020—touching one in six web users each day. The reason for this growth is the business results Algolia delivers for its customers, such as reducing total cost of ownership by 80% while increasing conversion rates by 30% or more.

“From day one, Algolia has delivered on a need for personalized, relevant search experiences, and the company continues to be the Search-as-a-Service market leader,” said Philippe Botteri, partner, Accel. “Algolia has achieved impressive product innovation, international expansion and industry leadership to date. We’ve believed in the business from our initial investment and are more excited than ever about the opportunity in front of us as digital transformations accelerate.”

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