Glean AI Archives

Embedded Finance Solutions Provider Pipe Acquires Glean.ai

By David Penn Posted on April 15, 2025
Categories: Alumni News, Glean AI, Mergers & Acquisitions

Embeddeed finance solutions company Pipe has acquired spend management innovator Glean.ai.
The acquisition will enable the combined entity to respond to two main pain points for small- and medium-sized businesses: access to capital and effective spend management.
New York-based Glean.ai made its Finovate debut at FinovateFall 2022.

Embedded finance solutions provider Pipe announced its strategic acquisition of AI-powered spend management innovator Glean.ai. Founded in 2020, Glean.ai offers a spend management solution for small- and medium-sized businesses that provides one-click access to spending trends, billing mistakes, and opportunities to uncover savings. Glean.ai’s solution also features real-time, cross-functional budgeting and billpay tools, and leverages AI to examine spending patterns over time to help business owners and managers make better decisions.

“Today, I’m thrilled to share that Glean.ai is joining forces with Pipe, a fintech company that offers embedded financial solutions within the software platforms business owners use every day to manage their operations,” Glean.ai CEO Howard Katzenberg said in a statement. “This is a huge milestone—not just for us, but for every finance team we’ve had the privilege to support. Pipe shares our vision for intelligent finance infrastructure and their commitment to innovation makes this partnership even more exciting.”

The acquisition comes at a time when many small businesses (nearly half according to the U.S. Small Business Administration) are relying on personal credit cards to help fund their businesses. Moreover, in many instances, these business owners are not separating their personal from their business expenses. With this acquisition, Pipe is seeking to serve small- and medium-sized businesses with the kind of spend management tools they typically have not been able to access. The acquisition will complement Pipe’s embedded capital and business charge fraud solutions, which are made available via the company’s payments and vertical software partners. Pipe noted that Glean.ai will continue to be available to current and new customers directly from Glean.ai.

Pipe CEO Luke Voiles called the acquisition a strategic move that “empowers us to address the two biggest pain points faced by small businesses today—access to capital and effective spend management.” Voiles added, “by combining Pipe’s innovative technology, resources, and expertise with Glean, we’re giving business owners the precise tools they need to thrive.”

Founded in 2019, Pipe builds embedded finance solutions for growing businesses that reside inside the software those firms are already using. With partners ranging from vertical SaaS companies to payments platforms, Pipe’s technology integrates seamlessly into existing platforms, enabling companies to easily launch customer-friendly solutions, go to market in weeks rather than months, and drive growth. The company’s flagship offerings include an embedded working capital solution, Capital, and a branded business card to optimize spend management.

New York-based Glean AI made its Finovate debut at FinovateFall 2022. At the conference, the company demonstrated its strategic Accounts Payable (AP) platform that leverages automation and deep insights to help firms pay the right vendors the right amounts at the right times.

Photo by Rock Staar on Unsplash

Glean.ai Brings Automated Accruals Technology to its Intelligent AP Platform

By David Penn Posted on June 7, 2023
Categories: Alumni News, Daily news, Glean AI

Glean.ai has launched its Automated Accruals solution to help finance teams more accurately report costs.
The new offering is a feature of Glean.ai’s intelligent AP platform.
The company made its Finovate debut last year at FinovateFall in New York.

Spend management solutions company Glean.ai has announced new functionality for its Intelligent AP platform. The company recently unveiled its Automated Accruals technology, which will help companies more accurately report costs.

“Managing accruals manually in spreadsheets and over email is very time-consuming, error-prone, and can lead to an inaccurate reporting of expenses,” Glean.ai Growth Marketing Manager Spencer Campbell noted in a company blog post. Campbell wrote that reconciling accrued expenses is one of the “most time-consuming parts” of any accountant’s close process. “They have to determine which costs have been incurred by their company that have not been invoiced yet,” Campbell explained, “if invoices have been received for prior accruals, and if prior estimates of costs incurred were sufficient.”

To this problem, Glean.ai has introduced Automated Accruals as the latest feature on its spend management platform. The enhancement works by alerting users to potential accruals based on either past billing patterns or budget expectations. This enables finance teams to consult directly with vendors to determine if services were performed and to secure estimates for costs. From here, users can record the expense amount, record date, and reversal date for the accrual. Glean.ai’s technology automatically syncs the entries to the user’s general ledger, and also features real-time reporting to ensure transparency and a comprehensive view of all accrued expenses whether they are booked or reversed.

The addition of automated accruals, according to Glean.ai, is an example of the smart automation that drives the firm’s innovations. The company uses the phrase “Intelligent AP” to describe its approach to leveraging the data that flows AP and accounting to automate processes and empower decision-making.

Howard Katzenberg (CEO), Ankur Patel (Head of Data), and Alexander Jia (Head of Product) co-founded Glean.ai in 2020. The company demoed its technology in its Finovate debut at FinovateFall in September of last year. At the conference, Katzenberg talked about how millions of small businesses inadvertently overspend when paying vendors. This occurs, Katzenberg said, due to errors or other costs that could be reduced or eliminated with greater scrutiny. “Fifteen percent of their cash is silently walking out the door,” he said. To this end, Glean.ai analyzes all of the business’ bills at the line item level. This enables the technology to track purchases, prices, and volumes, and deliver “timely, relevant, and actionable ways to save money.”

Katzenberg added, “There are many AP solutions that will help you pay your vendors quicker, but there are none that will help you pay your vendors less – until now.”

Glean.ai is headquartered in New York. The company has raised more than $10 million in funding from investors including Outpost Ventures and B Capital Group.

Photo by Pixabay

FinovateFall 2022 Sneak Peek: Glean AI

By Madeline Clines Posted on August 24, 2022
Categories: FinovateFall 2022, FinovateFall 2022 Sneak Peek, Glean AI

A look at the companies demoing at FinovateFall in New York on September 12 and 13. Register today and save your spot.

Glean AI’s Strategic Accounts Payable (AP) platform helps companies save money through deep insights and automation.

Features

Identifies hard-to detect trends and uncovers areas of overspending
Saves time by eliminating manual tasks with automated data extraction
Compiles all vendor data in one centralized location

Why it’s great

Glean AI’s algorithms proactively identify areas where money is being misspent (ex: excess licenses, incorrect pricing).

Presenter

Howard Katzenberg, Founder & CEO
Howard Katzenberg is a seasoned entrepreneur and early “FinTech” industry pioneer, with expertise in scaling venture-backed businesses through IPO, strategic planning, and financial leadership.
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