Brazen Careerist is known in DC tech for setting up virtual job fairs for big-name companies like Raytheon and Deloitte. But it’s also been working on a major expansion and rebranding for the last five years that's finally being announced today.

The Arlington company dropped “Careerist” from its name, raised $4.7M, and is officially going public with its B2B chat-based engagement platform. The company has been quietly selling the product for a couple of years, and the new funding allows Brazen to put on the turbochargers and expand into new markets. CEO Ed Barrientos (right) and president Ryan Healy say the 24-person company will grow to over 40 by the end of the year with Java developers and salespeople and plans to nearly triple its square footage in Arlington this year.

Penn State (Ryan’s alma mater) has been using the chat platform for networking events to connect alumni for professional development and  students with potential employers. KPMG is using it to let employees know about internal job opportunities and connecting them with management and partners. Gainsight is connecting its customers to each other and using it to connect people who are attending its big annual conference a few weeks before the event.

Text-based messaging is a hot space now, says Ed, and being used more than any other form of communication. Employee engagement is also a huge area of interest in HR. Brazen’s specialty is its algorithms to connect people who don’t know each other but should be connected. Other similar chat tools like Slack connect people within a company who know each other. Ed and Ryan say the funding will help Brazen target new customers. One area of interest is using the tool for mentoring, particularly in large government agencies.

Brazen’s recent round was led by Osage Venture Partners, bringing its total outside funding to $10M. Also in the round were existing investors Militello Capital and Kegonsa Capital Partners. A newcomer to Brazen’s investor roster is Randstad Innovation Fund, which was recently raised by the Netherlands-based HR and staffing company. Brazen was only its fifth investment. Ed says the company raised money from outside of the region because so few local VCs have cash to invest.