Multiplier raises USD $35 million to buy specialist firms

Multiplier has raised USD $35 million in a Series B funding round led by The General Partnership.

The Singapore-based company also said Allen Shim, former Chief Financial Officer of Slack, has joined as President and Chief Financial Officer as it expands its network of accounting and other professional-services firms.

Multiplier acquires established specialist firms and keeps their existing names, leadership teams, and operating independence. Professionals responsible for client relationships share in the value created across the wider group, while the parent company provides capital, infrastructure, and technology support.

Ribbit Capital and Lightspeed Venture Partners also participated in the round. The new funding will be used to acquire more firms and expand Multiplier's technology and operating teams.

Its model focuses on acquiring firms in narrow professional niches and building artificial intelligence tools around their daily work. The company's technologists work inside the firms it owns, giving them direct access to workflows, data, and established client processes.

Growth model

Unlike software providers that sell tools to outside advisory firms, Multiplier operates as a holding company that owns the businesses where the technology is used. The company says this structure is intended to avoid some of the barriers that have limited software adoption in professional services, where work is often closely tied to experienced practitioners and long-standing client trust.

Professional-services firms have often proved hard to scale because growth depends on the time of senior experts. Information is also commonly spread across documents, financial statements, and email, creating administrative work that can be difficult to standardise.

Multiplier said recent advances in AI create more scope to automate preparatory and administrative tasks while leaving professionals responsible for final advice and client relationships. Its stated aim is to increase the number of clients those professionals can serve rather than reduce headcount.

"An AI's answer is worth zero until a professional puts their name on it," said Noah Pepper, Founder and Chief Executive Officer of Multiplier.

"We're not trying to remove experts from the work. We're giving firms AI muscle while keeping their human heart, providing them with better tools, more time for judgment, and the capacity to serve more clients without lowering the bar on quality or trust," Pepper said.

Firm acquisitions

Multiplier has acquired eight firms so far, including five over the past year, and has four more under signed term sheets. Its network now serves clients in more than 10 countries, according to the company.

The group said founders and leadership teams remain in place after an acquisition. It added that firms in the network have started referring clients and business opportunities to one another.

Shim will oversee finance, operations, partnerships, and people, and will help build out Multiplier's San Francisco office. He previously helped take Slack public and remained with the company through its sale to Salesforce.

The appointment adds a senior finance executive with public-market and transaction experience as Multiplier increases the pace of acquisitions. The company was founded by Pepper, a former Stripe executive who led its Asia-Pacific business.

Anthony Kline, Partner at The General Partnership, said the market backdrop made the investment case clear.

"Accounting is a large, durable market that has long been constrained by expert capacity," Kline said.

"Multiplier is not trying to replace the professionals clients trust. It is building technology into the firms themselves so those professionals can serve more clients, respond faster, and spend more time on work that requires judgment. Noah has the operating experience and long-term approach needed to build this model at scale," he said.