The Importance of Technology in Financial Reporting and Auditing

The process of financial reporting and auditing is often overlooked by technology startups. However, recent errors in financial reports, such as the one experienced by Lyft, have shown that this topic is not only important, but can also have dire consequences for a company’s success. Mary Antony and Kelsey Gootnick, founders of InScope, recognized the need for technology innovation in this area after years of working in finance for companies like Miro, Autodesk, Dropbox, Flexport, and Yelp.

Introducing InScope

In 2023, Antony and Gootnick started InScope, a San Francisco-based company focused on leveraging machine learning and large language models to revolutionize the financial reporting and auditing processes for mid-market and enterprise companies. The company officially launched in beta in early 2024, catering to customers who use Oracle Netsuite.

The Puzzle of Financial Statements

The founders of InScope come from accounting backgrounds, and witnessed firsthand the difficulty that companies face when putting together financial statements and disclosures. These processes can take weeks to months to complete, and are often prone to errors that can have severe consequences if presented incorrectly. As Antony explains, “It really looks like a sudoku puzzle that you have to do with trial-and-error to get right. Cash flow statements are one of the most important metrics for a company, so they shouldn’t be a sudoku puzzle, or a puzzle in general. We make it possible for our customers to have effortless, but accurate and reliable financial statements every time.”

Innovative Features

In InScope’s first iteration, the product focused on automating GAAP (generally accepted accounting principles) and non-GAAP reporting, including cash flow statements. But the company plans to release more helpful features later this year, such as a tool to assist customers in drafting annual and quarterly financial reports. These features aim to provide effortless, accurate, and reliable financial statements for companies.

Competition and Growth

InScope’s closest competitor is Workiva, another finance and audit software company. However, Antony and Gootnick note that Workiva’s product is primarily focused on public companies, whereas InScope caters to private companies. While some legacy professional service firms offer similar services, Antony and Gootnick believe that InScope’s product is complementary, rather than competitive, to these firms.

The company currently has five early customers and is in the process of signing an additional six. They are already generating revenue and are looking to increase both their customer base and revenue by 10 times by the end of the year. This impressive growth attracted $4.3 million in seed funding from investors, including Lightspeed Venture Partners and Better Tomorrow Ventures, as well as individual investors like Vipul Ved Prakash (founder and CEO of Together AI), Jake Heller (founder and CEO of Casetext), Debbie Clifford (chief financial officer at Autodesk), Justin Coulombe (chief financial officer at Miro), and Nadia Asoyan (chief financial officer at Strike).

Future Plans

The founders of InScope have big plans for the company’s future. They aim to expand their customer base to 50 companies by the end of the year and will use the investment to scale their product, grow their team, and enhance their AI capabilities. Better Tomorrow Ventures, which has been advising the company since its inception and was part of their first accelerator program in 2023, is excited about the company’s potential for success. Co-founder Sheel Mohnot states, “When we met the team through our accelerator program, we quickly noticed how dedicated and passionate they were to fix a critical component that can be detrimental to a company’s success. After advising the team for a few weeks, we knew that if anyone could tackle this problem, it would be Mary and Kelsey.”