Pittsburgh firm LUMA acquired by San Francisco tech company

The Pittsburgh-based tech firm LUMA was acquired last week by Mural, a fast-growing company based in San Francisco that has been deemed a unicorn because the privately held startup is valued at more than $1 billion.

LUMA created the LUMA System, a collection of design methods that provides a common language for teams at tech companies and other creative fields to collaborate more easily. It has been used by more than 3,000 organizations worldwide.

Details of how much Mural paid for LUMA were not released.

LUMA co-founder and CEO Chris Pacione said the acquisition creates opportunities for LUMA to reach more people and deploy the LUMA System on a larger scale.

Pacione said LUMA’s acquisition is another win for Pittsburgh’s growing tech industry. LUMA will remain headquartered in Pittsburgh, though most of the work being done at LUMA and Mural is done remotely. With the acquisition, Mural now employs 900 people in 29 countries.

“This is another sign that companies with Pittsburgh roots are leading the way when it comes to innovation and forward-looking practices that will define the future of work,” said Pacione.

The Pittsburgh region is now home to 60,000 jobs in tech employment sectors, according to the Computing Technology Industry Association. The growth of tech firms and tech jobs has increased substantially over the past several years, even accelerating during the pandemic.

Mural co-founder and CEO Mariano Suarez-Battan said bad meetings lead to lost ideas and frustrated teams, and that LUMA will help Mural fix these problems.

“As a part of MURAL, LUMA will help advance collaboration design, a new discipline that will level up how people work together,” Suarez-Battan said. “This acquisition is the first public step in our mission to support collaborative intelligence for the new hybrid workplace.”