AI startup Pie lands $19.5 million Series A funding in round headed up by Lightspeed Venture Partners
Pie, an AI powered platform for small businesses, has announced a $19.5 million Series A led by Lightspeed Venture Partners, bringing its total funding to $23.7 million. The round included participation from Capital One Ventures, Max Levchin’s SciFi VC, F-Prime, Commerce Ventures, WEX Venture Capital, and existing investors.
The company has also announced its emergence from stealth and launched Front Desk, an AI product that answers calls for small business owners 24/7, takes bookings and reservations, and responds to customer questions.
Founded by former Square and Toast operators Syed Ali and Akhil Mantripragada (pictured below), Pie says it is is building the growth infrastructure layer for Main Street businesses at a time when customer discovery is shifting across AI search, Google and digital channels. Since launching its first AI powered growth product in late 2025, it has grown to reach thousands of small business customers while in stealth, largely through referrals and platform partnerships, and expanded its product suite across AI search, growth, and Front Desk.
“Small business owners have been stuck with expensive, opaque agency models for decades,” says Syed Ali, Co-founder and CEO, Pie. “Every owner I talked to said some version of the same thing: ‘I need more customers, and I can’t afford an agency.’ We built Pie to fix that problem and bring enterprise grade growth capabilities to the small businesses that power local economies.”
Pie’s platform is built around three products. AI Search helps businesses show up as local discovery moves into AI powered search experiences like ChatGPT, Claude and Perplexity. Growth then helps businesses acquire customers across high intent local channels like Google Maps, Yelp, Nextdoor and other digital platforms. Front Desk helps businesses capture demand once it comes in by answering calls, taking bookings and responding to customer questions.
“Pie is bringing AI to Main Street by starting with one of the biggest pain points for small business owners: finding new customers,” says Aaron Frank, Partner at Lightspeed Venture Partners. “Customer acquisition is a powerful entry point, but the broader vision is to build an AI platform that can support small businesses across more of their daily operations over time. Syed and Akhil have built a product that solves an immediate revenue problem today while laying the foundation for something much larger.”
“Small businesses are notoriously hard to build for and even harder to reach,” says Max Levchin, Founder at Affirm and PayPal. “But the Pie team seems to have the rare combination of founder-market fit, distribution strategy, and product velocity to win this historically challenging market.”
“Pie has made local marketing incredibly simple to manage across our 65 salons,” says Jason Siska, Vice President at Moxie Management Group, a Supercuts franchise operator. “The platform’s intuitive UI allows us to launch campaigns quickly and get locations up and running in a fraction of the time it takes with traditional agencies. We maintain full control over our monthly spend, avoid expensive agency retainers, and consistently see measurable results. Most importantly, we’re driving double digit year-over-year sales growth across our locations.”
The Series A will help Pie scale its platform distribution model, deepen its product suite and grow its team.
2026 RTIH Innovation Awards
AI will be a key focus area at the 2026 RTIH Innovation Awards.
The awards are now open for entries and celebrate global retail technology innovation in a fast moving omnichannel world.
Our winners will be revealed at the 2026 RTIH Innovation Awards Ceremony, taking place at The HAC in Central London on Wednesday, 4th November.
Check out our 2025 winners here.
Our 2025 hall of fame entrants were revealed during a sold out event which took place at The HAC on 16th October and consisted of a drinks reception, three course meal, and awards ceremony presided over by award winning comedian, actress and writer Tiff Stevenson.
In his welcome speech, Scott Thompson, Founder and Editor, RTIH, said: “This is the awards’ fifth year as a physical event. We started off with just 30 people at the South Place Hotel not far from here, then moved to London Bridge Hotel, then The Barbican, and last year RIBA’s HQ in the West End.”
“But I’m conscious of the fact that, to quote the legend that is Taylor Swift, You’re only as hot as your last hit, baby. So, this year we’ve moved to our biggest venue yet, and also pulled in our largest number of entries to date and broken attendance records.”
He added: “This year’s submissions have without doubt been our best yet. To quote one of the judges: The examples of innovative developments across both traditional and digital retail spaces were truly remarkable.”
Congratulations to our winners, and a big thank you to our sponsors, judging panel, the legend that is Tiff Stevenson, and all those who attended our 2025 gathering.
