Resolute is focused on finding extraordinary entrepreneurs and helping them succeed over the course of their career. Because our approach is so entrepreneur-focused, we are comfortable investing at the earliest of stages, often before any other investors. We make investment decisions quickly.  Very soon after our first meeting, we will either pass or articulate a discrete roadmap to a decision. We will invest as little as $50k and as much as $750k in a company’s initial financing. We prefer being a lead investor and guiding our entrepreneurs to the key milestones for a successful venture round.   We dislike “headless” seed rounds that lack a lead investor. Post investment we immediately focus on ensuring these milestones are clearly defined, and work to help our entrepreneurs achieve them. Rinse and repeat.

Resolute Ventures

Amicus Capital is a seed stage information technology investment fund. They invest in entrepreneurs who are developing innovative information technology solutions to problems that affect large numbers of businesses or consumers. They like to invest early, typically in the first funding round, together with angel investors, friends and family. Over the past decade, they’ve invested in more than 60 seed stage information technology companies, many of which were subsequently funded by leading Silicon Valley venture capital firms and went public or were acquired by the most recognizable names in the industry.

Amicus Capital

[Arba](http://www.arbagroup.com/home.html) is a seed investment group that focuses on the internet, tech, and other new media.

Arba Seed Investment Group

Mastercard is a payments and technology company that connects consumers, businesses, merchants, and governments. They provide data services and marketing center. Their marketing materials help card portfolios and businesses. They also provide fraud prevention solutions and payment ecosystem security.

Mastercard

Silicon Valley Bank works with technology, life science, cleantech, venture capital, private equity, and premium wine businesses. SVB provides industry knowledge and connections, financing, treasury management, corporate investment, and international banking services to its clients worldwide through 27 U.S. offices and seven international operations.   Banking innovative companies and exclusive wineries, Silicon Valley Bank’s diverse financial services, knowledge, global network, and world-class service increase its clients’ probability of success. Forbes Magazine ranks SVB among America’s Best Banks, and Fortune Magazine named SVB one of the Best Companies to Work For in 2012.

Silicon Valley Bank

FundersClub focuses on Seed and early stage investments. Investments include Coinbase, Instacart, Flexport, Le Tote, Teespring, Memebox, GitLab. FundersClub is the world's first online venture capital platform. Backed by Y Combinator, First Round Capital, Spark Capital, Intel Capital, Draper, Andreessen Horowitz, Felicis Ventures, and more; FundersClub Inc. was founded in 2012 and is based in the United States.

FundersClub

Bloomberg Beta is an early-stage venture capital firm with $375M under management, capitalized solely by Bloomberg. The fund exists to expand Bloomberg’s horizons by investing in companies built by extraordinary founders that make business work better, with a focus on machine intelligence.

Bloomberg Beta

500 Global is a multi-stage venture capital firm with $2.4 billion in assets under management. The firm invests in founders who are building fast-growing technology companies. It focuses on markets where technology, innovation, and capital can generate long-term value and economic growth. 500 Global collaborates with key stakeholders and provides advisory services to governments on fostering entrepreneurial ecosystems to support startups. The firm has invested in over 5,000 founders and more than 2,800 companies across 80+ countries. It has funded over 35 companies valued at more than $1 billion and over 160 companies valued at over $100 million, including those that are private, public, or have exited. The team consists of over 190 members based in more than 25 countries, with experience as entrepreneurs, investors, and operators from leading technology companies.

500 Global

Mastercard Start Path is a global effort to support innovative early stage companies developing the next generation of commerce solutions today. Start Path was launched at the end of 2013 with an objective to help early stage startups succeed by leveraging a variety of options to work together. Startups can benefit from the knowledge of a global network of Mastercard experts, access to Mastercard customers and partners, and the ability to innovate on top of Mastercard solutions. For more information visit www.startpath.com or follow Mastercard Start Path on Twitter at @MAstartpath

Mastercard Start Path

Redpoint has partnered with visionary founders to create new markets and redefine existing ones since 1999. The firm invests in startups across seed, early, and growth phases. In total, Redpoint manages $4 billion across multiple funds.

Redpoint

Lightspeed Venture Partners is a venture capital firm that engages in consumer, enterprise, technology, and cleantech markets. It focuses on seed, early-stage, later-stage, expansion-stage, start-ups, growth companies, and incubation, and specializes in debt financing for start-ups and growth companies. Lightspeed Venture Partners invests in various sectors that include enterprise, consumer, big data, bitcoin, enterprise technology, cleantech, mobile, internet, financial technology, cloud solutions, e-commerce, storage, media, networking, energy, and software, software-as-a-service, information technology, biotechnology, and social. It mainly invests in countries such as the United States, Europe, Israel, China, and India.

Lightspeed Venture Partners

Sand Hill Angels is a group of Silicon Valley angel investors passionate about helping entrepreneurs get to the next level. What makes the group unique is the collective experience of its members building and scaling deep technology companies. The group has been around for more than two decades. Sand Hill Angels works openly and collaboratively with venture capital funds, other angel organizations, and the Bay Area ecosystem that fosters the growth of technology startups.  For additional information, visit www.sandhillangels.com or follow @SandHillAngels.com on Twitter.

Sand Hill Angels

Coatue is a privately owned hedge fund sponsor. The firm invests in the public equity markets globally focusing on investments in technology, media, and telecommunications in addition to other sectors. It employs a long or short strategy to make its investments.

Coatue

Geodesic Capital is a venture capital firm that provides mid and later-stage investments to firms in the consumer technology industry. They assist entrepreneurs who are expanding into Asia, beginning with Japan. They provide unrivalled access to senior-level executives, partners, and government officials that portfolio firms require to prosper abroad.

Geodesic Capital

AppZen

AppZen is an artificial intelligence platform for modern finance teams, helping them to reduce spend, comply with policy, and streamline process. It automates manual process, uncovers problems, and optimizes decision making for enterprises around the globe, including one-fourth of the Fortune 500.  The platform combines patented deep learning, computer vision, and semantic analysis with intelligence from thousands of online data sources to understand financial transactions in business context and make decisions before those transactions happen. AppZen was founded in 2012.

<div>AppZen offers an AI-based payable and expense auditing automation platform to optimize the decision-making of finance teams. The AI platform delivers intelligent decision-making solutions by leveraging computer vision, deep learning, and semantic analysis of thousands of online sources to understand financial transactions and their business context.</div>

Platforms, apps, and cards to keep the corporate wallet in check

Business Expense Management

AppZen and Lyndon Group Forge Transformative Partnership to Streamline Expense Audit Solutions

<div>
 
 AppZen offers an AI-based payable and expense auditing automation platform to optimize the decision-making of finance teams. The AI platform delivers intelligent decision-making solutions by leveraging computer vision, deep learning, and semantic analysis of thousands of online sources to understand financial transactions and their business context. 
 
 
 Its accounts payable (AP) solutions cover the process from invoice entry to enforcing spend policies and auditing AP spending. Users can also automate standard operating procedures (SOPs) and check payments so that they can choose when to pay. Invoices are audited for duplicates and can be automatically entered in relevant accounting, procurement, or ERP systems using its integrations (which include Oracle, SAP Ariba, and Coupa). AppZen claims its solution improved AP efficiency by 80%.
 
 
 The expense audit solution helps organizations verify expense claims against the activity, such as comparing travel expense claims against the distance traveled (among other data points). The audit solution can identify unauthorized purchases in over 40 languages, thereby supporting cross-border businesses in mitigating fraud. 
 
 
 AppZen also launched an AppStore in June 2021 to offer users easy access to finance AI apps to automate spend management, compliance, and decrease finance team workloads, without straining its in-house IT resources. This includes common spend controls such as monitoring alcohol spend, detecting US sales taxes, rental car upgrades, and sign-in sheet detection. 
 
 
 Key customers and partnerships
 
 
 AppZen had over 1,800 customers as of June 2021, including large enterprises such as Salesforce, Airbus, Amazon, and Novartis. Its customer base spans over 40 countries and comprises roughly a third of the Fortune 500 companies (as of April 2022). 
 
 
 Funding and financials
 
 
 The company was valued at USD 500 million as of September 2019, almost triple its USD 175 million valuation as of October 2018. 
 
</div>

<div>
 
 Expensify offers an app that provides a diverse range of expense and payment solutions and insights for individuals and enterprises. It offers business expense cards and reimbursement platforms with automated receipt scanning and approval workflows. Expensify also provides bill payment solutions with automated tracking, approval, and payment.&nbsp;
 
 
 
 
 Its corporate cards also offer benefits to users in the form of discounts when using several B2B platforms such as Stripe, AWS, Quickbooks, and Stack Overflow. Expensify can also be integrated with several third-party HR, tax, accounting, and travel platforms software.
 
 
 
 
 The company follows a freemium pricing model. For business expense cards, users are charged a monthly fee per card. Non-card reimbursement and business payout management platforms are subscription-based.
 
 
 <a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/23003">
 In October 2023
 </a>
 , Expensify added a feature to its app that allows users to send and receive money, split expenses within individuals or groups, and use chat functionality, signaling the company's entry into personal finance.
 
 
 
 
 Key customers and partnerships
 
 
 
 
 As of October 2021, the platform had over 10 million end users, across several enterprises including La Trobe University, Swatch Group, Pinterest, and Atlassian. Moreover, Expensify reportedly had around 
 <a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/23613">
 719,000 paid members
 </a>
 as of November 2023.&nbsp;
 
 
 
 
 Funding and financials
 
 
 The company&rsquo;s
 <a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/26941">
 revenue amounted to USD 150.7 million
 </a>
 in 2023, with an adjusted EBITDA margin of 13.2%.
 
 
 
 The company&rsquo;s 
 <a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/16593?industryIds=76">
 revenue amounted to USD 169.5 million
 </a>
 in 2022, with an adjusted EBITDA margin of 25.1%.
 
 
 
 
 The company was listed on the Nasdaq in November 2021, where it raised around USD 70 million at a USD 2.2 billion valuation. 
 
</div>

Expensify

Coupa offers a procurement and accounts payable management software that lets enterprises automate the management and settlement of payables (from invoice matching to payments) and supply chain activities. It also offers a travel and expense (T&amp;E) management platform, with embedded fraud detection, for employees to access integrated travel management solutions including travel booking, price assurance, and other traveler services.The company also operates the “Coupa App Marketplace,” a platform for business users to connect with certified solutions for supply chain, procurement, and finance functions. In March 2024, the firm introduced a number of <a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/27258">AI-based features</a> to automate tasks, improve efficiency, and enable smarter decision-making for businesses. The firm also plans to launch Forecast Collaboration, a new solution to improve communication between buyers and suppliers by May 2024.In <a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/33007">August 2024</a>, Coupa introduced a further series of AI-driven features such as Coupa Navi, Contract Intelligence enhancements, and the Coupa Advantage Marketplace. to help companies optimize process efficiency and improve productivity.The company raised aggregate gross proceeds of USD 153 million through an IPO in October 2016 and was listed on the Nasdaq. However, in December 2022, the company <a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/15272?industryIds=76">entered a definitive agreement </a>(completed in February 2023) to be acquired by Thoma Bravo for USD 8 billion and be delisted from the Nasdaq. Key customers and partnershipsThe company offers its solutions to several industries, ranging from automotive and banking services, to oil and gas, and telecommunications. Its clients include several large global enterprises, including Sanofi, MGM Resorts, Salesforce, Juniper Networks, and Cooper Standard.Coupa delivers its payout solutions in partnership with several companies. Its virtual card partners include AirPlus, HSBC, Citi, and J.P. Morgan, while its payment tech providers include Stripe, Mastercard, PayPal, and TransferMate. In October 2022, <a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/14052">Coupa partnered </a>with integration and automation solution provider, TradeCentric, to optimize the former’s procurement solutions. The company subsequently <a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/17669">partnered with </a><a href="https://sp-edge.com/companies/59">Goldman Sachs </a>in April 2023, to leverage the latter’s payment, treasury, and banking infrastructure solution, “Transaction Banking (TxB).”In January 2024, the <a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/25856">company partnered with Tonkean, </a>a no-code platform to develop business applications to launch “Tonkean Intake Orchestration for Coupa”, in Coupa App Marketplace, to improve intake-to-procure processes for customers.Moreover, Coupa launched an investment fund of USD 50 million in June 2021 to invest in early- and growth-stage startups in the business spend and procurement management industry. The funds first two portfolio companies were SaaS expense management platform, <a href="https://sp-edge.com/companies/408080">Zylo </a>, and procurement management platform, <a href="https://sp-edge.com/companies/152710">SourceDay </a>.

Coupa

<div>
 
 Brex offers short-term financing (including earned revenue access) and expense management solutions. The platform primarily offers cards for businesses, including business expense card and corporate cards for larger businesses. Brex issues corporate cards based on several factors such as funding raised, revenue, and cash balances, instead of relying solely on credit scores for approvals.&nbsp;
 
 
 
 
 Brex also offers an automated bill payment solution for enterprises to manage payouts. This lets users choose several payment methods (ACH, wire transfers, checks, or cards) and also integrates with accounting systems such as Quickbooks and Xero. The company subsequently launched &ldquo;Brex payables&rdquo; in August 2023, an AI-enabled AP solution (from receiving invoices to approving payment) that combined bill payment and purchase card capabilities.
 
 
 
 
 Key customers and partnerships
 
 
 
 
 Brex users span several groups, such as tech startups, venture capitalists, and ecommerce companies. Brex primarily targets SMBs, and, as of October 2021, it reportedly generated around 60% of its revenue from mid-market companies. However, the company shifted its focus away from small businesses in June 2022, to focus on startups (pre-seed and venture funded companies) and mid-to-large-sized companies. Brex laid off around 11% of its workforce in October 2022, to increase focus on the company&rsquo;s new strategy, and achieve sustainable profitability for years to come. It subsequently laid off a further 20% of its employees in January 2024 to make the company more agile and accelerate its path to profitability.
 
 
 <a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/20254">
 Brex partnered
 </a>
 with 
 <a href="https://sp-edge.com/companies/359227">
 Airwallex
 </a>
 in July 2023, to leverage AIrwallex&rsquo;s network of 50+ global licenses, to support local currency collections for global corporate cards and employee expense reimbursements across the globe.
 
 
 
 
 In December 2023, Brex along with&nbsp; 
 <a href="https://sp-edge.com/companies/780841">
 Ramp
 </a>
 
 <a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/25146">
 collaborated with Uber&rsquo;s enterprise arm
 </a>
 to improve expense processing efficiency by automating the receipt handling for Uber transactions while ensuring&nbsp; compliance with company policies. 
 
 
 
 
 Funding and financials
 
 
 
 
 Brex raised USD 745 million in Series D funding across two rounds in 2021 (October and April) and was valued at USD 12.3 billion as of October 2021 (up from USD 7.4 billion in April).&nbsp;
 
</div>

Brex

<div>
 
 Navan (formerly known as TripActions) offers a business and personal travel platform and pivoted to the expense management business by launching &ldquo;TripActions Liquid&rdquo; (Liquid) in early 2020. The company continues to offer a range of expense management solutions beyond just travel expense claims, including business expense cards and an employee reimbursement platform.&nbsp;
 
 
 
 
 The expense cards include physical and virtual cards with spend controls, policies and compliance, reconciliation, and custom dashboards for insights. Moreover, the cards reportedly bear zero foreign transaction fees (as of April 2022).
 
 
 
 
 The company claims that the Liquid platform reduces expense reporting hours by upto 66% and reconciliation time by 95%.&nbsp;
 
 
 
 
 Key customers and partnerships
 
 
 
 
 Navan had around 8,800 enterprise customers as of April 2022, at which point Liquid was used by over 600 companies, including Zoom, Lyft, Pinterest, and Patreon.&nbsp;
 
 
 
 Navan partnered with Visa and Mastercard in June 2023, to launch &ldquo;Navan Connect&rdquo;, a patented card-link solution that allows businesses to connect corporate cards from third parties, for expense management and reconciliations. The company planned to expand its network tie-ups in the future.&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;
 
 
 Funding and financials
 
 
 
 The volume of transactions processed through Navan reportedly increased by 7.5x since the period between June and September 2022.
 
 
 
 In October 2022, Navan 
 <a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/13743">
 raised USD 304 million in funding
 </a>
 , comprising a USD 154 million Series G round and a USD 150 million structured financial deal, to invest in expanding its global operations. The round valued the company at USD 9.2 billion, against its USD 7.25 billion valuation in October 2021. Moreover, the funding came just weeks after Navan reportedly
 <a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/13440?industryIds=76">
 filed confidentially to go public
 </a>
 in Q2 2023 at a USD 12 billion valuation.&nbsp; 
 
</div>

Navan

<div>
 
 Ramp offers a comprehensive set of tools for expense and payout management. Its &ldquo;5-in-1&rdquo; software covers business expense cards, expense reimbursement platforms, and bill payment solutions (through ACH, checks, and virtual cards) and also includes automated accounting and reporting. Ramp came out of stealth in February 2020 with its business expense card offering (including physical and virtual cards) and thereafter expanded to other expense and payout solutions. The platform also offers bi-directional integration (to incorporate a contract review process into the approval workflow), dynamic intake forms, purchase order enhancements, among other features
 
 
 
 
 The platform lets users set and implement spend controls and expense policies and also helps enterprises manage their expenses through categorization, real-time reporting, and insights. Ramp claims it can enable businesses to close their books 86% faster than through traditional expense methods and reportedly reduces its users&rsquo; spending by 3.3% on average. 
 
 
 Ramp has used acquisitions as a means of inorganic growth. In June 2023, it 
 <a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/19688">
 acquired Cohere.io
 </a>
 , to drive AI-related projects to help customers save time and money. Ramp also offers autonomous agents that concentrate on essential tasks such as expense management, fraud detection, and contract negotiations, utilizing both internal data and the broader linguistic context from GPT and the internet. In January 2024,
 <a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/26114">
 Ramp&nbsp; acquired Venue,
 </a>
 a procurement solutions provider (primarily for large organizations) to improve employee purchase request, approval, and payment processes..
 
 
 
 
 Ramp can also be integrated with a range of third-party apps and service providers, including Amazon Business, Lyft, Corporate Traveller, Google Suite, and BambooHR.&nbsp;&nbsp;
 
 
 
 
 The company primarily generates revenue through card payment interchange fees, and was yet to generate revenue from its bill payment solution as of March 2022, despite seeing volume growth. Ramp expanded its bill payment solution in August 2022, by
 <a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/13437">
 launching buy-now-pay-later (BNPL) solution
 </a>
 , &ldquo;Flex.&rdquo;
 
 
 
 
 Key customers and partnerships
 
 
 
 
 Although Ramp initially focused on the SMB market, the company has expanded its focus market to larger enterprises, including Ro, Avelo, and Anduril. Ramp had over 15,000 business customers as of August 2023. Based on the new customer sign-ups in June 2022 (compared to May) Ramp reported faster growth in its enterprise segment customer base - up 300%&nbsp; - than its mid market (up 50%) and SMB (up 22%) customers.&nbsp;
 
 
 
 Ramp has also invested in several expense management companies across the globe, including MENA-focussed 
 <a href="https://sp-edge.com/companies/1833119">
 Pluto
 </a>
 (February 2022) and Indian fintech 
 <a href="https://sp-edge.com/companies/947785">
 Karbon
 </a>
 .&nbsp;
 
 
 <a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/24091">
 In November 2023,
 </a>
 Ramp collaborated with Microsoft Copilot, integrating AI for finance tasks, including card issuance and anomaly detection, reducing manual work with the&nbsp; aim of streamline finances for enhanced strategic focus.
 
 
 
 
 In December 2023, Brex along with&nbsp; 
 <a href="https://sp-edge.com/companies/780841">
 Ramp
 </a>
 
 <a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/25146">
 collaborated with Uber&rsquo;s enterprise arm
 </a>
 to improve expense processing efficiency by automating the receipt handling for Uber transactions while ensuring&nbsp; compliance with company policies. 
 
 
 Funding and financials
 
 
 
 
 Ramp reportedly processed over USD 10 billion in accounts payable volumes annually, as of January 2024.
 
 
 
 
 In 
 <a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/28597">
 April 2024
 </a>
 , Ramp raised USD 150 million in an extension to its series D round, at an increased valuation of 7.65 billion compared to its valuation of USD 5.8 billion in August 2023 where it raised USD 300 million in funding. The funding was allocated to expand its use of AI and to back potential acquisitions.
 
 
 
 The company 
 <a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/21235">
 raised USD 300 million
 </a>
 in a funding round in August 2023. The funds were earmarked for accelerating expansion, product developments, and recruitment.
 
</div>

Ramp

Solutions that enable employees to avoid out-of-pocket spending on business expenses, using company-issued payment cards.

Platforms that let employees scan receipts (through OCR) and automatically submit claims to receive reimbursements with the limited involvement of admin, finance, or HR staff.

Platforms offering payout automation solutions that cover the process either entirely or partially—from vendor onboarding to making payments.

Can extract information from invoices/receipts, classify expenses, automate approval and reconciliation processes, and offer insights

Tools can usually be customized based on a user's business nature and workflows

Partner with open banking infrastructure providers to enable account-to-account payments and topping-up cards

Insights and visibility on expenses and payout processes improves transparency in business spend and reimbursements

Solutions commonly include software platforms that digitize, automate, and offer insights on expenses for businesses

PROMINENT_CATEGORY

<div>
 AppZen, an AI business process automation company, has teamed up with finance and spend management consultancy, Lyndon Group, to improve expense audit procedures. The Lyndon Group will use AppZen's Expense Audit solution throughout North America. The partnership merges the consultancy abilities of the Lyndon Group with AppZen's AI technology. This collaboration aims to deliver superior technical and consulting solutions to clients wanting to enhance their expense audit processes.&nbsp;
 The integration of AppZen's AI with current systems aims to assist businesses in maximizing their technical investments, diminishing manual spend audit labor, and focusing on strategic initiatives.
 
</div>

AppZen

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