- Founded in 2021, Berlin-based akirolabs empowers procurement organisations to unlock 4-5x higher sustainable business value beyond traditional cost savings.
- The funding round was led by HTGF, OTB Ventures and D11Z. Ventures and strengthened by angel investments from industry leaders Fredrick Spalcke, Heiko Schwarz, Markus Ehrle, and Detlef Schultz.
- The funds will be used to evolve akirolabs SaaS product and enhance its AI capabilities, as well as to further scale customer growth and business operations.
Investors in this round included HTGF, OTB Ventures, D11Z. Ventures, and Switzerland's Serpentine Ventures, alongside angel investments from industry leaders such as Fredrick Spalcke (ex-CPO of Phillips & Huawei), Heiko Schwarz (CEO of riskmethods), Markus Ehrle (VP and General Manager EMEA at ServiceNow), and Detlef Schultz (former CEO of the Vodafone Procurement Company).
Notably, akirolabs has also appointed Jens Rassloff as the Chairman of the Advisory Board. Jens holds similar roles at Coparion, Parloa, and d.velop and brings a wealth of knowledge and experience in the tech industry, specifically in the areas of growth, innovation, and investment strategies.
akirolabs’ large corporate customers across the globe and across various industries, as well as internationally leading analysts, appreciate and recognize akirolabs’ innovation power and uniqueness. The startup's recognitions include Gartner “Cool Vendor”, Gartner's “Hype Cycle Sample Vendor”, “IDC Innovator 2023”, Spend Matters “Future 5”, and ProcureTech's “Top 100 Pioneers”.
akirolabs highlights that while digitalization in procurement in the past was primarily focused on operational and tactical solutions for efficiency and savings, industry benchmarks indicate a much higher value potential in strategic procurement. This potential is often untapped due to capability gaps. Also, the current macroeconomic challenges and recent black swan events have amplified and accelerated the need for more strategic procurement. To address this challenge, akirolabs offers an AI-powered strategic procurement SaaS solution, enabling its customers to unlock and achieve 4-5 times higher value from procurement, - beyond savings.
“We're very grateful for the trust placed into akirolabs in this funding round. It emphasizes the imperative of advanced strategic procurement software in today's economic environment. In these challenging times, akirolabs does not just facilitate savings on price.”, says Michael Pleuger, CEO of akirolabs. “Much more, our solution delivers tangible improvements in total cost and supply chain resilience, sustainability and agility, strengthening the competitiveness of our customers.”
“...What you have created is significant... there is no doubt in my mind that this is a breakthrough innovation. akirolabs is on a trajectory to eliminate much of the category management function as we know it. today.", says Elouise Epstein, KEARNEY Partner & best-selling author on Digital Procurement.
Christian Arndt, Senior Investment Manager at HTGF, added “We are convinced that akirolabs builds an international category leader in strategic procurement and we are looking forward supporting the team on its path.“
“With the advent of LLMs, there is an opportunity to transform the strategic aspects of procurement decision-making. Founding teams that combine a deep domain expertise with technical prowess will thrive in this environment.”, says Mateusz Lukasik, Investment Director at OTB Ventures. “akirolabs fits the bill and we are excited to support them.”
“Adding value beyond cost savings, akirolabs will set new standards in strategic procurement management.”, says Thomas R. Villinger, Managing Director at D11Z.Ventures.
About akirolabs:
akirolabs, founded in 2021 by Michael Pleuger, Detlef Schultz, Christoph Flöthmann, and Tim Ergenzinger, develops and provides an AI powered SaaS platform for collaborative strategic procurement. akirolabs is based upon a world-class and industry proven strategic procurement process, methodology and toolkit, embedded into an intuitive cross-functional collaboration workflow and enriched with all relevant internal and external business insight. akirolabs’ unique approach delivers “Procurement Strategies with Value & Purpose” and a significantly broader and 4-5 times higher value contribution than traditional souring solutions.
