Adam Fields, the founder of ARTA, announced a $3m round of fundraising and the opening of an office in London today. The funds will allow ARTA to expand internationally:

The seed round of financing is drawn in part from additional investments from several previous ARTAinvestors, such as art-world heavyweights Sotheby’s and David Zwirner and venture capital firms including Notation Capital, and in part from a consortium of new Chinese and European investors to help support international expansion.

“What ARTA has developed is a game-changer for logistics in the art world. They have given us a tremendous advantage by allowing us to streamline our operations; something that is incredibly important in a market that is constantly evolving,” said David Zwirner. “ARTA‘s transparent model is also very rare in the startup arena, something that my gallery values and appreciates.”

In addition to focusing on international growth, ARTA has used the additional funding to hire six new employees, including new Heads of Marketing and Engineering, and is preparing to launch partnerships with ArtBase and Phillips in September. Through an API integration, clients of ArtBase, an inventory management system used by hundreds of galleries and museums, and Phillips can easily send inventory information to ARTA and receive shipping quotes with a single click of a button. Additional integrations, set to launch later this year, are also in development, which the goal of creating more efficiencies and scale for both sellers and shipping companies.