David Prosser

San Francisco startup Freehand has secured $75 million in seed funding to revolutionize accounts payable for large enterprises. The company's AI-powered agents automate complex invoice decisions, traditionally a manual and error-prone process in supply chains. Freehand's technology analyzes vast data, including contracts and communications, to decide whether to pay, dispute, or negotiate invoices. This approach has led to clients speeding up workflows seven-fold and reducing spending by up to 10% through fraud detection and negotiations. With major clients like Meta and Unilever already on board, Freehand aims to expand its AI solution, offering significant savings and efficiency in the $20 trillion US supply chain market.

Online shopping search is frustrating for consumers and costs retailers over $2 trillion annually in abandonment. San Francisco startup Onton aims to change this with Ontology 1, an AI-powered search model. It seeks to reduce online shopping decision time to near zero by enabling natural language queries, image search, and personalized recommendations. Onton, which began in home furnishings and is expanding to apparel, also offers its technology as a white-label solution for retailers. Co-founder Zach Hudson highlights that traditional e-commerce search is outdated, and specialized generative AI is crucial for handling complex product data. Despite facing competition from tech giants and other AI players, Onton believes its model addresses a significant market demand for more intuitive and efficient online discovery, with the AI search market projected to grow 17% annually.

Endra is using the proceeds of its recent $50 million fundraising to launch in the US and the UK, as competition in the AI-powered MEP space continues to increase

When accountant Michael Godsmark started reconciling the accounts of one of his biggest clients earlier this year, he quickly realised that artificial

The AI market in finance and accounting is projected to grow almost 40% annually, reaching $97 billion by 2033, driven by companies like Maximor. Maximor's CEO, Ramnandan Krishnamurthy, confirms strong traction, with sales growing 35-fold since its seed funding a year ago. Its AI tools automate manual finance tasks, allowing professionals to focus on strategic work. Krishnamurthy stresses the importance of "agentic AI" for end-to-end workflow automation, distinguishing it from tools that only handle individual tasks. Maximor's solution manages 98% of finance work, learning from exceptions to achieve near-autonomy. Despite a competitive market, investors believe Maximor's focus on complete, auditable workflows positions it for continued success.

Market research is a costly and time-consuming endeavor, with global spending expected to exceed $116 billion by 2030. New York startup Echovane aims to revolutionize the sector by offering an AI-powered, end-to-end solution that significantly reduces costs and time without sacrificing quality. The company, founded by Smriti Gupta, Vipul Nair, and Himadri Roy, has just secured $1 million in funding. Echovane's AI agents manage the entire research process, from participant recruitment to data analysis, providing a "done-for-you" service. Major clients like Procter & Gamble, Coca-Cola, Haleon, and Trustly praise its ability to deliver complex, multi-market studies. The new funding will accelerate market penetration and enhance Echovane's AI infrastructure and global participant network.

San Francisco-based Alloy Robotics has secured $8 million in funding to tackle a critical issue in the rapidly expanding robotics industry: frequent robot failures and the complex, time-consuming process of diagnosing their cause. Despite significant market growth, robots across all sectors are prone to bugs and mis-steps. Alloy's platform leverages AI agents to swiftly pinpoint the root cause of these failures. CEO Joe Harris developed the solution after recognizing engineers' struggles with fragmented data. Since its commercial launch, Alloy has achieved over 50% monthly customer growth, processing data from more than 10,000 robot runs. The new funding will support further expansion and R&D.

Cloud computing has transformed the way both individuals and organisations work with technology.

The pictures were shocking. Earlier this month, the Ukrainian Government shared a video on social media showing a drone pursuing a street vendor on a city street in the Kherson region of the country.

Cloover , the Berlin-based energy sector start-up, will today announce it has raised a new $100 million funding facility, taking the total size of its financing capacity to more than $1.3 billion.