Stuut Raises $29.5M Series A Led by Andreessen Horowitz to Automate Accounts Receivable
I absolutely did, but if you haven’t, it’s an exciting reality TV escapade through some of the dirtiest jobs around. There are rattlesnake catchers, of course, but there are also a deluge of examples of industrial jobs like laying pipes, crushing cars, and grinding concrete.
“These are our customers,” Alaruri says proudly.
Alaruri’s startup, Stuut, is in a complicated business: accounts receivable, money owed to a company for goods or services that have been delivered, but not yet paid. And there’s a reason why Stuut focuses on these companies.
In the tech sector, companies tend to have “a big wad of money in their bank account from venture capital firms,” Alaruri said. But for many of Stuut’s clients, collecting payments is existential: “These companies actually need revenue to pay bonuses. They actually need revenue to pay holiday bonuses and need to hire more people to accelerate their growth.”
Alaruri co-founded Stuut (a name taken from a South African rugby term meaning “to support” or “to hold on”) with Ben Winter and Miraj Mohsin in 2024. Stuut uses AI to automate accounts receivable, including invoice tracking, payment reconciliation tasks, and alerting human employees. Stuut’s clients so far include Honeywell, PerkinElmer, Verifone, Wayfair, Active International and Greenlight Guru. And to be absolutely clear: Alaruri is perfectly happy to work with tech companies, if they’re interested.
Now, Stuut has raised a $29.5 million Series A, led by Andreessen Horowitz, Fortune exclusively learned. Activant Capital, Khosla Ventures, 1984 Ventures, Carya Venture Partners, Page One Ventures, Vesey Ventures and Valley Ventures participated in the round.
Stuut and his clients are trying to solve an effectively universal problem: Companies can lose up to 5% of their EBITDA by manually tracking payments. Stuut’s customer acquisition so far has been primarily through cold calling and network effects. And, compared to other companies, it was a pretty simple pitch: I can automatically get the money owed to you. And the rise was rapid.
“Technically, we started the business early last year,” Alaruri said. “But I would say the first day was really around November, December of last year… We started to see the impact. We launched a company called CharterUp in two days, raised $3.4 million and saw a 20% increase in fundraising.”
These are also companies interested in their part of the AI action, but need a product that delivers on its promises.
“You have to be able to prove that you can do what you say you’re going to do [with AI]” said Alaruri. “You look at the old wave of software and you have people promising automation – and they take 12, 18, 24 months to deploy. So it’s important that you say, “Hey, we can save you 40% in six months, and we’ll be up and running next week,” and then you can execute.
See you tomorrow,
Allie Garfinkle
X:@agarfinks
E-mail:alexandra.garfinkle@fortune.com
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Venture Capital Deals
– Organic Feedan AI-driven protein design company based in Emeryville, California, has raised $106 million in funding. AltimeterCapital And VesosExpeditions led the tour and were joined by SparkCapital, PreviewPartnersAnd AirStreetCapital.
– Ampèreluettea Singapore-based developer of next-generation power infrastructure for AI data centers and critical power applications, has raised $80 million in Series A funding. WaldenCatalystBusinesses And Temasek led the round.
– Arbitratora New York-based platform designed to connect healthcare patients, providers and payers in one place, has raised $52 million in funding. TriEdgeInvestment And MFO Companies led the tour and were joined by WindRose Healthcare Investors and others.
– ModernLifea New York-based AI-powered life insurance brokerage, raised $20 million in Series A funding. ProsperCapital led the tour and was joined by NewYorkLifeBusinesses, NorthwestMutualFutureBusinessesAnd You allege.
– Automatica San Francisco-based workflow automation platform for businesses, raised $15.5 million in Series A funding. Happy led the tour and was joined by Initialized, KhoslaBusinessesAnd Y combiner.
– a potAIa San Francisco-based developer of an AI chemistry platform designed to accelerate the synthesis of small molecules for drug discovery, has raised $13 million in seed funding. KhoslaBusinesses, FiftyYearsAnd Invest quickly led the round and were joined by others.
– Polya San Francisco-based, AI-powered cloud file browsing company, raised $8 million in seed funding. Happy led the tour and was joined by Bloomberg Beta, NextView, FigmaBusinesses, AITo agree, Wind companiesAnd MVP Companies.
– alphaXiva San Francisco-based platform that manages AI research, benchmarks and models, has raised $7 million in seed funding. MenloBusinesses And Haystack led the tour and were joined by Shakti VC, ConvictionIntegrate, From the startBusinessesand angel investors.
– Pibit AIa San Francisco-based underwriting AI developer, raised $7 million in Series A funding. StellarisAdventurePartners led the tour and was joined by Y combiner And RangeBusinesses.
– Mantiscaresa San Francisco-based platform designed to help cancer patients and their caregivers track their symptoms, medications and appointments, has raised $5.4 million in seed funding. PearVenture capital And SozoBusinesses led the round and were joined by angel investors.
– SynthioLaboratoriesa San Francisco-based conversational AI platform designed for customer engagement in life sciences, has raised $5 million in seed funding. ElevationCapital led the tour and was joined by 1984Businesses, CulminateXVPartners, Y combinerand angel investors.
– Braiseda San Francisco-based AI-powered revenue cycle management platform for healthcare, raised $4.3 million in seed funding. LinkAdventurePartners And YesCombinator led the round.
– Kaaja San Francisco-based AI platform designed to automate loan underwriting for small businesses, has raised $3.8 million in seed funding. RelationshipBusinesses led the tour and was joined by Businesses for a better future and others.
– Oriona Denver, Colorado-based risk intelligence platform has raised $3.5 million in seed funding. DynamoBusinesses led the tour and was joined by Tech stars, BvvcAnd ServiceSupplierCapital.
– BigRentalsan equipment rental platform based in Los Angeles, California, has raised $2.8 million in seed funding. CATAdventurePartners led the tour and was joined by iron springBusinesses, ForumBusinessesand others.
– Deductiona New York-based developer of an AI-powered tax accountant, has raised $2.8 million in pre-seed funding. One-way businesses And CreatorBusinesses led the tour and were joined by Alpine VC, Intuition, CharlieMooreand angel investors.
Private equity
– GTCR agreed to acquire TrusteeTrustBusinessa private wealth manager and trust company based in Boston, Massachusetts. Financial terms were not disclosed.
– LawnPRO Partnerssupported by HCIEquityPartnersacquired TotalLawnCarea lawn care company based in Indianapolis, Indiana. Financial terms were not disclosed.
– Wafra acquired a minority stake in Ardiana private equity firm based in Paris, France. Financial terms were not disclosed.
Funds + Funds of Funds
– DigitalBridge Groupa Boca Raton, Fla.-based private equity fund raised $11.7 billion for its third fund focused on digital infrastructure companies.
