Former Microsoft execs launch AI agents to end Excel-led finance

Despite millions spent on financial software, many finance teams still rely on Excel to close their books and reconcile numbers while preparing them for audit. Two former Microsoft executives view it as a problem — and they have started Maximor to replace spreadsheets with AI agents for the grunt work finance teams perform.

Excel spreadsheets are everywhere in finance. Even with dedicated ERP, CRM, and billing systems, many mid-sized companies and enterprises still export transactions into Excel for manual reconciliation. Teams often treat spreadsheets as makeshift databases, sometimes even relying on functions like VLOOKUP — a function used to pull matching numbers from one table into another — to line up figures across files.

Maximor aims to replace finance teams’ reliance on Excel with its AI system, and has emerged from stealth with a $9 million seed round led by Foundation Capital.

The startup uses a network of AI agents that connect directly to ERP, CRM, and billing systems to continuously pull transactions. That, co-founder and CEO Ramnandan Krishnamurthy (pictured above, right) said in an exclusive interview, helps unify operational and financial data and provide real-time financial visibility — instead of waiting until month-end to sort it all out.

The approach should help reduce the time needed for the month-end close, he believes. For instance, Maximor says that proptech firm Rently, one of its early customers, cut its closing from eight days to four and avoided two additional accounting hires. Rently was able to redirect nearly half its team’s time to strategic work after using Maximor’s agentic platform, Rently’s CFO Dustin Neel said.

Maximor’s financial agents plug into ERPs like NetSuite and Intacct, accounting tools such as QuickBooks and Zoho Books, and a range of payroll, CRM, and other SaaS platforms. Once connected, they generate workpapers, reviewer notes, and audit trails — helping streamline audits.

Although Maximor aims to reduce reliance on Excel, it still allows teams to export reconciled data into spreadsheets — a format that many auditors and finance staff prefer before sending numbers to audit.

“We’re interoperable with Excel on that part, as our platform does the work and can present it in our own UI or in Excel directly,” Krishnamurthy told TechCrunch.

In addition to its AI agents, Maximor offers human accountants as a human-in-the-loop option for its AI work, or as an accounting service for companies without in-house finance teams. It’s an interesting failsafe, given that Maximor pitches itself as an AI startup that automates this work. Relying on humans may seem at odds with that promise.

However, Krishnamurthy told TechCrunch that the software is self-sufficient, with agents handling end-to-end work independently. The agents act as preparers and people act as reviewers, he said, adding that it works much like traditional accounting teams, where junior staff handle routine tasks and managers focus on oversight.

Krishnamurthy co-founded Maximor in the summer of 2024 after years at Microsoft as a founding member of its digital transformation group, where he led finance and data projects for Fortune 500 clients, including Coca-Cola. He teamed up with Ajay Krishna Amudan, now CTO, who previously worked on a revamp Microsoft’s internal revenue systems, among other projects there. The two have worked together for 14 years, starting as students at IIT-Madras.

The duo’s finance experience at Microsoft helped attract angel investors including CFOs and finance leaders from Ramp, Gusto, MongoDB, Zuora, and the Big Four accounting firms, Krishnamurthy said. The seed round also drew Perplexity CEO Aravind Srinivas, a former IIT-Madras classmate of Krishnamurthy, and Zuora CEO Tien Tzuo, who was introduced by the VCs backing the round. Institutional investors Gaia Ventures and Boldcap also took part.

Maximor, headquartered in New York with an office in Bengaluru, has 18 employees split almost evenly between the U.S. and India, and is actively hiring in both locations. The startup targets companies with at least $50 million in revenue and already counts early customers in the U.S., China, and India. Moreover, Maximor’s software supports both GAAP and IFRS standards, catering to enterprises with a global footprint.