A Manchester technology company aiming to tackle “inefficient and unprofitable” shopping areas has raised £1.5m.

Sticky, which was co-founded by Priscilla Israel and James Garner in 2020, has secured the seed funding in a move led by Praetura Ventures with backing from Cornerstone VC and follow on funding from SFC Capital as well as new angel investors.

The funding will help the business to increase its revenue and to continue to build its “partner ecosystem”.

Customers of Sticky, which includes the likes of Byron Burger, use branded stickers known as stickies which house NFC-based technology.

They can be placed anywhere within customer sites, stores, the home and other physical spaces to “increase efficiency and let customers get things done quickly”.

Priscilla Israel said: “Sticky offers a no-code low-code solution that helps businesses innovate at speed. We help our customers see their physical space as an asset and as a way to make more money.

The future of physical spaces is well debated but at Sticky there is no debate about their future or value – they are where we all live and work.”

She added: “Tapping a sticky is as easy as a contactless payment so there is no need to open a camera, have high connectivity or enter any data, things which cause friction for businesses when relying on QR codes, apps and card machines. With one tap of a sticky an interaction or payment is complete in less than 10 seconds.

By applying this technology to their payments stack or replacing it entirely, our customers can turn anything into a point of sale, increasing revenue, speed of service and customer satisfaction.”

James Garner commented: “Just like online, there are no geographical limits to Sticky and consumers can even choose their language meaning everywhere they go their experience on Sticky is localised.

All without an app or sign up. It’s a kind of magic and universal communication; as easy as a hello or a smile. Every sticky is environmentally friendly and designed to last for ten years, replacing a significant amount of hardware that is expensive and goes out-of-date.”

He added: “Our seed funding will help us reach more leisure and retail businesses and help the world build software for physical spaces 10x quicker than before. We won’t stop until every interaction in a physical space can be 10 seconds or less.”

David Foreman, managing partner at Manchester-based Praetura Ventures, said: “Sticky has taken a visionary approach to the problem of unused retail space and online engagement in offline environments, and that is what attracted us to invest in the business.

Given the growing tech expertise we have at Praetura, including our operational partners and Praetura Ventures partner Andy Barrow, who was the former CTO at cloud giant ANS, we are looking forward to joining Sticky’s growth journey and playing our part in helping the company scale and break into new industries and verticals.”

Rodney Appiah, managing partner at Cornerstone VC, added: “Sticky’s innovative platform brings the rich functionality and customer experience of low-code platforms to physical spaces.

Its remote configurability, ease of use and reliability in low connectivity environments lowers the barriers to digital adoption for a range of businesses and provides a versatile toolkit to drive customer engagement, retention and revenue.

We’re delighted to support James and Priscilla on this journey and look forward to working with them both and the other investors in this round as the business scales.”

Stephen Page, CEO at SFC Capital, said: “The team’s exceptional resilience during the pandemic when we first invested highlights their strong dedication and commitment to innovation in the face of adversity. It’s a privilege to back our winners.”