Multiplier has successfully raised $35 million in a Series B funding round. These funds are intended to scale its artificial intelligence-powered professional services platform. The General Partnership led this round, with existing investors Ribbit Capital and Lightspeed Venture Partners also participating.
The acquired investments will be directed towards acquiring additional specialized firms that provide professional services. Furthermore, they will help the company grow its technological and operational teams in response to the increasing demand for AI-based business services.
Multiplier operates on a permanent holding company model. By acquiring existing enterprises, the company allows them to retain their names, management, and a significant degree of autonomy. Instead of replacing people with artificial intelligence, Multiplier creates AI-based products that enhance efficiency and the quality of customer service.
Founder and CEO Noah Pepper stated in a company blog post that AI should serve as a tool to empower working professionals, not replace them. He believes that AI tools allow specialists to dedicate more time to tasks requiring judgment by eliminating routine work.
Multiplier integrates its engineering teams directly into the acquired firms. The company has also hired over 30 technologists whose work, together with subject matter experts, leads to the creation of AI tools tailored to the needs of specific businesses. Since the companies using this technology are not exclusively owned by third-party software developers, Multiplier employees have access to client and supplier databases, which, according to the founders, means 'access to clients, products, and processes.'
The company's model is focused on industries where growth is limited by expertise. Many professional service firms rely heavily on experienced practitioners and manage information through disparate systems. Multiplier believes that AI can automate preparatory and routine tasks, leaving final decisions to qualified specialists.
Since its inception, the company has completed eight acquisitions, five of which were closed within the last year. It also has four other firms that have signed letters of intent. In total, the company's network serves clients in more than 10 countries.
The latest investment coincides with the appointment of a senior executive. This person will oversee finance, operations, partnerships, personnel, and the expanding San Francisco office. The company believes this approach ensures more effective scaling while preserving valuable client relationships and professional experience over time.
Allen Shim, former CFO of Slack, now holds the positions of President and Chief Financial Officer at Multiplier. The company plans to use the funds to effectively build a scalable technological base, team, and operational process architecture. Shim previously led the successful initial public offering of Slack before its acquisition by Salesforce.
According to The General Partnership, accounting and other professional services markets continue to face capacity constraints despite growing demand. The investment firm is convinced that Multiplier's approach allows trusted specialists to serve more clients without compromising service quality.
The new capital will primarily go towards additional acquisitions and further development of proprietary AI solutions. Multiplier intends to develop its specialized firms and improve its technological capabilities. The company's investment approach differs from traditional 'buy and build' strategies, where founders of acquired companies are completely replaced after the acquisitions. Instead, founders remain in leadership roles, receiving continuous support in the form of long-term capital and operational management.
Convex has raised $57 million in a Series B funding round. These funds are planned to be used to scale the development of its backend platform, which is specifically designed for artificial intelligence. The financing was led by Insight Partners, with participation from Etna Labs and all previous investors, including a16z and Spark Capital.
Thanks to this Series B round, Convex's total raised capital has reached $110.5 million. The company stated that it intends to use this money to improve its core platform, enhance tools for agentic development, and increase its staff in its San Francisco office.
Founded in 2021 by former Dropbox infrastructure engineers, Convex offers developers a fully integrated backend platform. This platform combines databases, functions, workflows, search, synchronization, authentication, and file storage into a single solution built for software development.
The fundraising comes amid the trend towards AI-powered coding and autonomous development tools. Convex believes that developers need infrastructure capable of handling the increasing complexity of applications while maintaining a high level of reliability.
The company posits that traditional backend infrastructure struggles to support the growing use of AI coding agents. According to the company, AI-generated applications based on standard databases can subtly introduce data errors that only manifest after deployment.
Internal testing revealed that 90% of AI-built applications running on traditional databases encountered data corruption in real-world operating conditions. In comparison, applications developed on the Convex platform passed the same tests without any failures.
Convex's backend includes built-in ACID transactions, end-to-end type checking, real-time subscriptions, and TypeScript support. These features reduce the need for manual integration of multiple services for developers and increase application reliability. Furthermore, Convex packages search capabilities, workflow automation, authentication, file storage, and retrieval-augmented generation functions, allowing AI applications to be enriched with organization-specific knowledge.
The platform has gained significant traction among developers building AI-based software. Convex currently supports nearly two million applications created by about 500,000 developers worldwide. The company also reported over 1.2 million weekly downloads from npm.
Convex's clients include OpenAI, Tripadvisor, Solana, Zapier, and Reducto. These organizations use Convex to simplify backend development while ensuring scalable, reliable performance for their applications.
Insight Partners noted that the growing adoption of AI coding assistants has exposed weaknesses in traditional software infrastructure. The investment firm believes that Convex provides developers with a more robust foundation where backend components function cohesively without the need for complex configuration.
Convex plans to use the new funding to accelerate product innovations amidst the transformation of software engineering influenced by AI. The company will direct funds toward creating new tools that simplify application development for both developers and AI agents that build software.
The company will continue to provide highly reliable backend products supporting increasingly complex AI-based applications globally. Convex is convinced that stable backend infrastructure is becoming critically important as artificial intelligence generates large volumes of application code.
Instead of combining disparate components, Convex offers a single unified platform, which effectively reduces complexity and prevents software bugs. The raised funds will strengthen Convex's engineering team and significantly expand its global developer ecosystem and platform capabilities. With fresh capital and a growing customer base, Convex aims to solidify its position in the evolving AI development infrastructure market, making the creation of reliable software faster and easier for both human developers and AI agents.
Horizon3, a San Francisco-based company specializing in artificial intelligence-driven cybersecurity, has secured $250 million in Series E funding. The funds will be used to further expand its platform internationally across the globe. Following this round, the company's valuation exceeded $2 billion.
This valuation is more than triple the approximately $600 million achieved during the previous funding round a year ago. The investment is intended to support Horizon3's native cybersecurity expansion into international corporate markets and client operational activities.
The funding was led by NightDragon and NEA, with participation from existing and new global strategic investors. The company plans to accelerate innovation and strengthen proactive cybersecurity capabilities for enterprises facing increasingly complex, AI-driven threats.
The raised capital will be utilized for global sales development, marketing expansion, market growth, and initiatives to develop autonomous cybersecurity technologies worldwide. Horizon3 intends to increase its presence in Europe and enter the Singaporean and Australian markets through strategic international expansion.
The company will increase R&D investments to enhance its NodeZero platform and AI-based security agents. These autonomous agents are capable of effectively and automatically detecting and remediating vulnerabilities within enterprise IT systems.
The investment will also go towards strengthening the proactive AI security platform and accelerating the innovation process. This financing follows growing enterprise demand for protection against AI-driven cyber threats and evolving regulatory compliance requirements.
Snehal Antani and Anthony Pillitiere, former colleagues from JSOC, founded Horizon3 with the goal of automating penetration testing via NodeZero. NodeZero continuously attacks client networks using self-guided penetration testing technology to proactively detect cybersecurity vulnerabilities.
Unlike annual audits, the platform safely tests live production environments using fully automated continuous security testing capabilities. This helps enterprises identify attack vectors, prioritize security weaknesses, and quickly and efficiently implement remediation measures.
The company reported conducting over 310,000 security tests in client production environments globally. Unlike traditional testers, Horizon3 assesses the entire enterprise infrastructure while production systems continue to operate uninterrupted.
The platform also incorporates intelligent honeypots that help organizations detect active attackers targeting enterprise systems in real time. Currently, the platform is used by over 7,000 enterprises across sectors such as banking, healthcare, public administration, and Fortune 10 companies worldwide.
The rapid adoption of AI has changed the approach to how security issues arise. For instance, an attacker with the right automated approach can quickly identify weaknesses and initiate complex attacks faster than manual methods, which reinforces the automation of security assessment.
Horizon3 reported a year-over-year recurring revenue growth of approximately 120%, noting that its annual recurring revenue approached $100 million last year. The company serves between 7,200 and 7,300 clients globally, including managed service providers and some of the world's largest corporations.
The new funding will also support the development of AI training loops, allowing AI defense systems to continuously improve by analyzing new attack methodologies. This should support enterprises' efforts to move from simple vulnerability awareness to the ability to automatically mitigate the most severe security threats.
Given that new cyber threats emerge at 'machine speed' and with high sophistication, the company asserts that AI-based security testing is indispensable for enterprises seeking to protect critical assets and confidential data.
The tech startup Genius AI has raised $44 million in investment to capitalize on the growing demand in the personal interaction-focused service economy. With this Series D funding round, the company's valuation reached $1.15 billion.
Venture firm Lux Capital led the round. Other investors included Bessemer Venture Partners, Imaginary Ventures, L Catterton Growth, 2048 Ventures, and StepStone Private Ventures. These funds will allow Genius AI to shift its focus from beauty booking software to autonomous artificial intelligence tools for a wider range of in-person services.
The company, formerly known as GlossGenius, was founded in 2015 by identical sisters Danielle and Leah Cohen-Shohet. They initially created GlossGenius to help salon owners, aestheticians, and spa operators manage their daily operations. Danielle independently learned programming and wrote the initial code, and over time, the software became a dominant force in the market, helping small businesses process payments, book clients, and promote their services.
The company is now changing its name to Genius AI, signifying a broader mission. As Genius AI, the platform will support all in-person professionals. It is planned for use in medical spas, physical therapy centers, fitness studios, injections, and health clinics.
The physical service economy in the United States includes about eight million businesses generating over $2 trillion in annual consumer spending. Although studies show that business owners spend nearly 36% of their working time on administrative tasks, Genius AI aims to completely eliminate this bureaucratic burden. The platform goes beyond simple assistance tools and transforms into an autonomous AI agent capable of handling complex tasks end-to-end, freeing up business owners to interact with clients.
The company demonstrates impressive growth and operational scale. Currently, the system is used by over 125,000 businesses across half of the US zip codes. Genius AI reports that its platform is approaching $200 million in annual revenue. To date, the company's tools have helped clients save over 112 million hours of administrative work. To deepen penetration into the healthcare sector, the company has added full HIPAA compliance, allowing physical therapists and clinical specialists to securely store sensitive patient data. This gives Genius AI a significant advantage over traditional tools lacking privacy protection. As artificial intelligence automates office work, human care becomes even more valuable, as skilled professionals like masseuses and trainers provide care that computer code cannot replicate. The new funding is planned to be used to expand software development and increase the engineering team.
