New Zealand artificial intelligence-augmented startup Grw AI has raised NZ$2.4 million ($2.2m) in a record pre-Seed round led by US investors in less than a month at a NZ$12 million valuation.
The investment from a roll call of West Coast VCs and Silicon Valley angel investors with see the Grw AI team relocate from Auckland to San Francisco to drive the platform’s US push.
Grw AI uses artificial intelligence to help B2B sales team close deals faster and increase revenue with scalable 1:1 coaching solutions.
Sydney early-stage fund Investible supported the raise alongside San Francisco’s Precursor Ventures and Seattle’s Incisive Ventures, with the angles including former Slack and Salesforce legal eagle David Schellhase, former Salesforce AppExchange EVP Woodson Martin, sales trainer and author Shari Levitin, former Salesloft CMO Lauren Vaccarello and former IBM exec Dave Brock.
The funds will be used to expand Grw AI’s product development team in New Zealand, and enhance the platform’s capabilities.
Cofounded by serial entrepreneurs Alex McNaughten, Alistair McLeay and Daniel Ash, Grw AI launched in April 2024, and now have 20 paying customers, mostly in the US, and also Australia, and New Zealand, including Nasdaq-listed IDEXX, TradeWindow, Neara, Lumin and Relab.
McNaughten, co-CEO, said great coaching is about getting people to think differently and ultimately act differently and scaling it in a personalised coaching has been a challenge.
“We believe that nothing impacts someone’s performance and career trajectory more than 1:1 coaching and we’re scaling it out to millions of sales professionals with AI” he said.
“This funding not only validates our vision but also accelerates our ability to transform the way organisations develop and empower teams.”
The trio headed to the US for funding, but also to confirm the opportunity for their startup Stateside
“Opportunity is everywhere in America and we found that people genuinely want to help,” McNaughten said.
“We met one of our investors while playing poker at an event in San Francisco, he committed over NZ$400,000 a few days later. Another investor we met at a coffee shop invested NZ$80,000 after a 40-minute conversation and then introduced us to the Chief Revenue Officer of Slack.”
Dan Ash, Grw’s CTO, said their international push is a lesson for Aotearoa founders to think big.
“In just three weeks in San Francisco, we completed our funding round,” he said.
“We want to send a message to fellow Kiwi founders: it’s absolutely possible to head straight to the US. There is so much opportunity, investment terms are far more founder friendly and Americans are extremely supportive of Kiwis – just get over there!”
Co-CEO Alister McLeay, said that while they’re US-bound, their hearts are at home.
“While we’re focused on the US market, we’re proud to have started in New Zealand and are excited to build a world-class engineering team here,” he said.
“[Advisor] Linda Jenkinson and her LevelUp community for growth founders in New Zealand has had a huge impact on our ability to go straight to the US.”
Relab head of growth Brigitte Mandeno said the results from using the startup have been impressive
“Grw AI’s platform has been invaluable for us leading to a remarkable 400% increase in monthly sales,” she said.
“The real-time feedback and tailored AI coaching have been game-changers, equipping our team to handle complex sales and customer questions with confidence.” –
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