Our Story
In 2015, Irwin CEO and Co-Founder David Whyte was working in institutional equity sales at Credit Suisse, working closely with global institutional investors and issuers to help to grow their mutual relationships. He became increasingly frustrated with the process of relationship building, which was exacerbated by the introduction of MiFID II, shifts in buy-side resource allocation, and sell-side pressures. Changes in the market meant that issuers had to be more proactive in their investor relations programs, but the tools meant to build and strengthen relationships on the market didn’t adapt to fit the needs of the evolving role of IR.
Together with Co-Founder and COO Mark Fasken, who had extensive experience in enterprise software, Irwin was founded in 2017. The company was built on the thesis that the combination of regulatory standards, industry conditions, and technological innovation was forcing significant changes in how capital markets operate. They wanted to create modern software that allowed capital markets professionals to build better relationships with the investment community and improve capital markets' transparency, accountability, and productivity.
In the following years, the Irwin team grew to over 100 employees, the customer list grew well into the hundreds, and the company attracted significant capital from investors, including a US$20 million Series A Financing led by K1 Investment Management in 2021.
As our early customers continued to grow, so did we, evolving and innovating the Irwin product and services, continuously pushing the boundaries of the status quo, and strategically enabling investor relations teams and companies of all sizes, from micro to mega-cap.
Today, the Irwin team provides our customers with the necessary tools and support to establish, maintain, and grow strategic relationships with the investment community through a better platform experience that has powered the success, innovation, and growth of thousands of IROs globally. We continue to believe in and elevate the role of the IRO, and we strive to be a trusted partner to all of our customers. We know that better investor relations is the catalyst to accelerating innovation, and strive to work towards our vision of bringing efficiency and transparency to global markets.