Tara AI Secures $10 Million in Series A Funding to Help Companies Build Better Software Faster
San Jose-based Startup Uses AI to Scope Projects, Identify Internal and External Resources and Monitor Performance for New Software Projects
SAN JOSE, Calif.–(BUSINESS WIRE)–Tara AI, a product management platform that uses machine learning to predict the technical tasks, engineering resources and timelines needed for new software projects, has secured $10M in Series A funding, led by Aspect Ventures, with participation from Slack Fund. Existing seed investors Y Combinator and Moment Ventures also participated in the round, bringing Tara AI’s total funding to date to $13M.
Tara AI is reinventing the slow, antiquated and completely manual product development process that causes enterprises to lose an average of $66B annually through inefficiencies in project scoping. Enterprises today are sitting on valuable data in their project management systems, git version control and workforce directories. Tara AI connects to this data and using machine learning models, predicts how to best build the software (technical tasks), how long projects should take (timeline) and who should execute (resources).
“It’s ironic the very teams delivering the world’s most widely used and innovative software, still don’t have a predictive solution for their own product development life cycle,“ said Iba Masood, co-founder and CEO, Tara AI. “Tara AI is eliminating the status quo of flying blind – which translates into lost time and money – and is creating a new normal where product teams can securely build on best practices and institutional knowledge, enabling them to deliver better software faster.”
Tara AI’s technology simplifies the process of building software by:
- Analyzing millions of open-source software projects from across the web to instantly create development tasks and timelines for product teams
- Enabling users to select the platform and features for their build based on TARA AI’s roadmap suggestions
- Generating a product scope and technical subtasks
- Recommending the best engineering talent – internally and externally – to execute on the build. Tara AI operates a contractor network of over 50K pre-screened developers.
- Using active feedback algorithms to monitor code commits and provide daily project updates
“With 45% of IT projects running over budget and billions lost due to inefficiencies in product scoping and resource allocations, there is a clear market need for what Tara AI offers,” said Lauren Kolodny, Partner, Aspect Ventures. “By leveraging the latest techniques in AI and enabling more meaningful collaboration, Tara AI is creating the industry’s first comprehensive platform for product management.”
Tara AI’s new financing will be used to fuel both customer and team growth. The company plans to triple headcount in 2019, focusing primarily on securing engineering talent to complement its founding team, which consists of former Google and Apple engineers.
“Tara AI is changing the way software products get built, and we’re thrilled to continue working with them,” said YC Partner Aaron Harris. “98.6% of the workforce is non-technical, including most project managers who are expected to make key estimations on crucial software projects. Tara AI helps teams scope their product builds, and in the process, is creating an entirely new category.”
Tara AI’s enterprise customers include Cisco, Orange Silicon Valley and Mower Digital. To date, its AI technology has ingested millions of data objects from publicly available data, and is growing at a rate of 20%, resulting in increasingly accurate algorithmic results for every project.
About Tara AI
Today’s enterprise organizations are constantly searching for ways to optimize the software development lifecycle. Platforms and tools to support this lifecycle are hyper focused on all the aspects of planning projects but fail to address how to execute on them. How do I build my software? With who? And where? Tara AI leverages machine learning to help enterprise organizations scope, allocate resources and build cutting-edge software products, enabling product teams to be on-time, on-budget and on-roadmap. For more information, visit: www.tara.ai.
About Aspect Ventures
Aspect Ventures, a leading venture capital firm in Silicon Valley, was founded in 2014 by two Silicon Valley industry veterans. Aspect raised its first institutional fund of $150 million in 2015 and a second investment fund of $181 million in 2017. Aspect invests across a broad array of industries including cybersecurity, future of work, digital health, and several other emerging technology areas. Portfolio companies include cybersecurity providers Forescout Technologies, Cato Networks, and Exabeam; future of work-focused companies Crew, Gusto, Chime, and The Muse; and digital health startups such as Vida Health, Grokker, and Solv. Taken together, the track record of the firm’s investment team includes 11 IPOs, 29 successful acquisitions, multiple billions in public market cap, and over 500 rounds in follow-on capital raised for portfolio companies.
Contacts
Jennefer Traeger
Traeger Communications
720-988-6149
jtraeger@traegercommunications.com