The European economy is on shaky ground, but there is a silver lining for enterprise startups: tools are booming to help businesses manage their finances in more stable and predictable ways.
In the latest development, Accounts IQ, a Dublin-based accounting technology company, has raised €60 million (about $65 million) to build the “finance function of the future” for mid-sized companies: through AI. Cloud-based, automated services are promoted. To help accounting departments work faster and smarter.
Accounts IQ, which has been in business (mostly bootstrapped) for nearly 20 years, was founded by accountants who saw an opportunity to build the tools they needed. As you might expect from this lineage, they've been financially savvy when it comes to development.
As of this fundraising, with only €12.7 million in external funding, AccountsIQ had acquired approximately 1,000 users, including 10,000 “entities” (for multiple operations) and 20,000 users. COO Darren Crane said in an interview that the company's CAGR has been steady at 30 percent annually for the past several years.
The company offers a range of digital accounting services (including accounts receivable and payable services, banking, business intelligence, forecasting and budgeting), digital tax services, and reporting. It also integrates with a wide range of third-party services, and has an API to work with other platforms, all delivered through a SaaS subscription that starts at around $250 per user per month. .
The platform is hosted on Azure, and Crane said it is leveraging Microsoft's AI tools as well as building in-house customizations to offer the next generation of services, including more robotic processes. It will include automation and AI-based features to speed up how it works for its customers. the work.
“We are now ready to take the AccountsIQ product and service to the next level,” AccountsIQ founder and CEO Tony Connolly said in a statement. “This investment comes at an excellent inflection point for our offering, allowing us to leverage AI tools into practical, easy-to-adopt services for our customer base. Finance team roles are more flexible, To make it more valuable, less repetitive and really more interesting.
The funding is a remarkable amount not only because it accounts for nearly five times more than IQ has ever raised before, but because startups, by and large, are still raising money. are struggling to do as well as they would have many years ago, especially in this startup's home market.
A recent report by the Irish Venture Capital Association found that in the first quarter of this year, start-up funding in Ireland fell by 48% compared to a year earlier.
But a regular pattern of bear markets has always been a consistent strength of solutions that help companies do their work better and more efficiently. Thus, the prosaic accounting startup continues to gain attention.
“Recognizing AccountsIQ's ability to accelerate product development with additional capital and expertise, we are excited to partner with them to take AIQ to the next level,” Martin Viegas, founding partner of Axiom Equity, said in a statement. But excited.”
For comparison, PennyLane, another accounting startup focused on the SMB market, raised $40 million a few months ago at a valuation of more than $1 billion. It now has about 120,000 users. AccountsIQ and its lead investor for this round, Axiom Equity, are not disclosing their valuation.
It's a potential competitor, although AccountsIQ would argue that PennyLane and others like it are looking to replace some of the entrants in the market selling to small businesses, such as Xero, QuickBooks and Sage. In contrast, Crane said Accounts IQ positions itself as a platform on which businesses will grow as they grow.
“We really offer an olive branch to the business,” he said. “When they grow, and a financial controller or a CFO comes along, they usually realize that they need to scale the business, and that in order to do that, they have to live in a new system. need.”
Accounts IQ's competitors include the likes of Sage Intact, NetSuite and Acumatica, he said.