Venture capital firm Accel invests $2 mn in SaaS-based startup Aavenir

Aavenir Software, which owns and operates an eponymous software-as-a-service (SaaS) platform, has raised $2 million in a seed funding round from venture capital firm Accel. 

The Plano, Texas-based company will deploy the fresh capital to accelerate the development of its products in the source-to-pay domain and expand its global reach by strengthening sales and marketing operations, according to a statement.

Founded last year by Jesal Mehta, Aavenir runs its India operations from Ahmedabad.

Mehta, an MBA graduate from Santa Clara University, has also worked in companies such as software firm Apttus and consumer service firm iMANY.

“Machine learning, natural language processing (NLP) and interactive chatbots offer tremendous opportunities to automate and simplify the complex source-to-pay process significantly,” he said. 

The company’s source-to-pay solution offers integrated products such as Contractflow for contract lifecycle management, RFPflow for sourcing management and Invoiceflow for accounts payable automation to enable efficient sourcing, procurement and contracting processes, the statement added.

“There has been a noticeable increase in the appetite of enterprises to automate the entire source-to-pay process in the recent years. We’re excited to be joining Aavenir on its mission of delivering the future of work,” Prayank Swaroop, partner at Accel, said.

Read: Covid-19 crisis spells medium-term pain for homegrown SaaS firms 

Founded in 1983 by Jim Swartz and Arthur Patterson, Accel works with startups in the seed, early and growth-stage investments. The company has offices in Palo Alto and San Francisco, with additional operating funds in England, India and China.

There have been some deals in the wider SaaS sector recently. 

In January, Dallas, Texas-based SmartKarrot, which operates an eponymous customer and product insights-oriented SaaS platform, raised $1 million in an angel funding round.

In the same month, Samya.ai, an emerging technologies-based SaaS startup, raised $6 million from Sequoia India.

In December last year, Mukesh Ambani-led Reliance Industries acquired a majority stake in NowFloats Technologies, a SaaS company that helps small businesses set up an online presence.