Marble, a startup constructing synthetic intelligence brokers for tax professionals, has raised $9 million in seed funding because the accounting {industry} grapples with a deepening labor scarcity and mounting regulatory complexity.

The spherical, led by Susa Ventures with participation from MXV Capital and Konrad Capital, positions Marble to compete in a market the place AI adoption has lagged considerably behind different data industries like regulation and software program growth.

"After we regarded on the economic system and requested ourselves the place AI goes to remodel the best way companies function, we targeted on data industries — particularly companies with hourly fee-based service fashions," stated Bhavin Shah, Marble's chief govt officer, in an unique interview with VentureBeat. "Accounting generates $250 billion in fee-based billing within the US yearly. There's an amazing alternative to extend effectivity and enhance margins for accounting companies."

The corporate has launched a free AI-powered tax research tool on its web site that converts complicated authorities tax information into accessible, citation-backed solutions for practitioners. Marble plans to increase into AI brokers that may analyze compliance situations and ultimately automate parts of tax preparation workflows.

Marble's backers share Shah's conviction concerning the market. "Marble is rethinking the accounting system from the bottom up. Accounting is likely one of the largest — and most missed — markets in skilled providers," Chad Byers, common accomplice at Susa Ventures, advised VentureBeat. "We've identified Bhavin from his time as an govt within the Susa portfolio, and have seen firsthand how sharp and execution-driven he’s. He and Geordie convey the proper mixture of operational depth and product intuition to an area lengthy overdue for change — and so they see the identical large alternative we do."

The accounting {industry} misplaced 340,000 staff in 4 years — and replacements aren't coming

Marble enters a market formed by structural forces which have basically altered the economics {of professional} accounting.

The accounting occupation has shed roughly 340,000 workers since 2019, a 17% decline that has left companies scrambling to fulfill consumer calls for. First-time candidates for the Licensed Public Accountant examination dropped 33% between 2016 and 2021, in accordance with AICPA data, and 2022 noticed the bottom variety of examination takers in 17 years.

The exodus comes as child boomers exit en masse. The American Institute of CPAs estimates that roughly 75% of all licensed CPAs reached retirement age by 2019, making a demographic cliff that the occupation has struggled to handle.

“Fewer CPAs are getting licensed 12 months over 12 months," Shah stated. "The {industry} is compressing on the similar time that there's extra work to be carried out and the tax code is getting extra difficult."

The National Pipeline Advisory Group, a multi-stakeholder physique shaped by the AICPA in July 2023, launched a report figuring out the 150-hour education requirement for CPA licensure as a major barrier to entry. A separate survey by the Heart for Audit High quality discovered that 57% of enterprise majors who selected to not pursue accounting cited the extra credit score hours as a deterrent.

Current legislative adjustments replicate the urgency. Ohio now gives alternate options to the 150-hour requirement, signaling that states are keen to experiment with pathways that would reverse enrollment declines.

Why AI remodeled regulation and software program growth however left accounting behind

Regardless of the occupation's challenges, AI adoption in accounting has moved extra slowly than in adjoining data industries. Harvey and Legora have raised a whole bunch of thousands and thousands to convey AI to authorized work. Cursor and different coding assistants have remodeled software program growth. Accounting, in contrast, stays largely depending on legacy analysis platforms and handbook processes.

Geordie Konrad, Marble's govt chairman and a co-founder of restaurant software program firm TouchBistro, attributes the hole to how individuals conceptualize AI's capabilities.

“It was apparent to many individuals that LLMs may do significant work by manipulating code for software program builders and manipulating phrases for attorneys. Within the accounting {industry}, LLMs are going for use as reasoning brokers," Konrad stated. " That requires a bit extra of a two-step evaluation to see why it's an enormous alternative."

The technical problem is substantial. Tax rules kind probably the most complicated, interconnected info methods that people have created — tens of 1000’s of interlocking guidelines, steerage paperwork, and jurisdiction-specific necessities that incessantly overlap or battle.

"If you wish to put AI by way of its paces and ask how far it's are available replicating cognitive features, that is an unbelievable playground to work in," Konrad stated.

A dramatic shift: AI adoption amongst tax and finance groups doubles in a single 12 months

Current information suggests the accounting occupation's stance towards AI is shifting quickly.

A 2025 survey from Hanover Research and Avalara discovered that 84% of finance and tax groups now use AI closely of their operations, up from 47% in 2024. The 2025 Generative AI in Skilled Providers Report from Thomson Reuters Institute discovered that 21% of tax companies already use generative AI know-how, with 53% both planning to undertake it or actively contemplating it.

Massive accounting companies have invested closely in AI infrastructure. Deloitte has developed generative AI capabilities inside its audit platform. BDO introduced a $1B funding in AI over the following 5 years. EY launched an AI platform combining know-how with technique, transactions, and tax providers. PwC estimates a whole AI-driven audit answer will launch by 2026.

However adoption at smaller companies stays uneven. In keeping with Thomson Reuters research, 52% of tax agency respondents who use generative AI depend on open-source instruments like ChatGPT moderately than industry-specific options—a sample that would shift as purpose-built alternate options emerge.

Marble's founders imagine the hesitance stems not from technophobia however from an absence of compelling choices.

“Corporations wish to embrace AI," Shah stated. “They simply haven't seen nice software program and tooling made for them. That's a part of the chance — to work with them and construct one thing they're excited to make use of on a day-to-day foundation.”

Can synthetic intelligence rescue accounting's billable-hour enterprise mannequin?

AI's arrival in accounting raises questions concerning the occupation's billing construction.

Accounting companies have historically generated income by billing purchasers for employees time, typically at multiples of worker compensation prices. Junior associates performing compliance work symbolize a major income stream. If AI can automate that work, does it undercut the enterprise mannequin companies rely on?

Marble's founders argue the other. The continual staffing scarcity has already constrained companies' skill to seize out there income. Advisory and consulting work — higher-margin providers that purchasers actively need — goes undone as a result of practitioners are buried in compliance duties.

"Everybody within the {industry} agrees that an unlimited quantity of advisory work merely isn't getting carried out," Konrad stated. "Clients need it. Corporations wish to do it as a result of it's high-margin, nice work. However no one will get to it."

The 2025 AICPA National Management of an Accounting Practice Survey helps this view. Corporations reported a median 6.7% enhance in internet consumer charges over the prior 12 months, with development in audit, assurance, tax providers, and consumer accounting advisory. Web remaining per accomplice climbed 11.9% from fiscal 12 months 2022 to fiscal 12 months 2024, reaching $252,663.

The survey additionally discovered rising curiosity in AI adoption, although most companies have but to allocate formal budgets or develop structured coaching packages. Continued adoption, the survey instructed, may assist increase providers and gasoline continued development.

Accountants gained't undertake AI instruments they’ll't belief with delicate consumer information

For AI to reach accounting, it should clear a excessive bar for information safety. Accounting companies deal with a few of the most delicate monetary info within the economic system. Practitioners can’t undertake instruments that create compliance or confidentiality dangers.

In keeping with Avalara's survey, 63% of respondents cited information safety and privateness considerations as the highest limitations to automating tax and finance features. The priority persists all through the adoption lifecycle, from preliminary choice by way of implementation and ongoing use.

Marble has made safety a foundational precedence. The corporate obtained software program compliance certification earlier than releasing any product and maintains that information privateness is embedded in its operational tradition from day one.

"Safety is on the core of what we’re constructing," Shah stated. "Each worker is aware of that safety is vital. It's part of our onboarding and one thing that we contemplate in every thing we do."

From quantity crunchers to strategic advisors: How AI may reshape accounting careers

Marble's founders reject the narrative that AI will solely take away from accounting jobs. They suggest as an alternative that AI will end in accounting jobs changing into extra strategic and fewer characterised by repetitive execution. 

They draw an analogy to structure, the place computer-aided design changed laborious handbook drafting. Architects didn’t disappear — they gained instruments that allow them spend extra time on artistic design and fewer on mechanical copy.

"In the event you take a few of the hours-intensive, much less artistic work out of what being a junior or intermediate accountant is, and also you substitute it with a task the place you're knowledgeable who’s being artistic, synthesizing concepts, and in a position to delegate lots of duties to AI assistant platform options, you find yourself with an {industry} that's simply much more enjoyable to function in," Konrad stated.

The shift may additionally enhance consumer outcomes. When accountants spend much less time on compliance, they’ll make investments extra within the strategic advisory work that purchasers worth.

"Not solely does the work change into extra pleasing due to what you may deal with, however that's additionally what your purchasers are going to worth extra from you," Shah stated.

The aggressive panorama: Marble faces well-funded rivals and legacy giants

Marble enters a market with formidable incumbents and well-funded rivals. BlueJ, a world tax analysis platform, has raised over $100 million. Thomson Reuters, CCH, and Intuit have deep buyer relationships constructed over a long time.

However the founders see alternative within the transition second.

"AI has modified what’s attainable within the {industry}," Shah stated. "We’re going to work with and combine with some know-how gamers within the {industry} and in addition compete with different gamers with new merchandise powered by AI. In some circumstances we’re going to overlook concerning the current know-how answer for doing issues and return to the duty itself. We have now completely new technological capabilities — how would you design one thing from a clean canvas that works with people to perform that job?""

The choice to supply a free analysis device displays Marble's go-to-market philosophy. By giving practitioners entry with no paywall, the corporate goals to construct belief and reveal functionality.

"It permits us to show a extremely compelling product that’s purpose-built to people who are apprehensive about use AI or query undertake it.  Now they don’t have to consider buying one thing that’s cost-prohibitive once they don't know combine it into their workflow," Shah stated.

The $250 billion query: Can a startup rework how America does its taxes?

Marble's roadmap extends past analysis. The corporate plans to develop AI brokers able to analyzing complicated tax situations, figuring out compliance points, and ultimately automating vital parts of compliance workflows — all whereas conserving practitioners in management.

The founders body success not by way of disruption however rebalancing. In the present day's tax work skews closely towards compliance, leaving the strategic advisory providers that purchasers crave — and that generate larger margins—perpetually undone. Marble's guess is that AI can flip that equation.

"Everybody desires it to look extra like compliance is finished less complicated, and also you spend time speaking about technique and planning," Konrad stated. "How do we alter that mix of compliance versus technique and planning to technique and planning first—with compliance as one thing that has been made dramatically less complicated?"

Whether or not Marble can execute on that imaginative and prescient stays to be seen. The corporate faces entrenched rivals, a occupation that has traditionally resisted technological change, and the inherent unpredictability of constructing AI methods for high-stakes monetary work.

However the founders are betting that the {industry}'s demographic shift will speed up adoption in ways in which earlier know-how waves couldn’t. With fewer accountants getting into the occupation annually and consumer calls for solely rising, companies could have an elevated urge for food to embrace instruments that allow their remaining employees do extra.

"AI goes to alter each {industry} — in some circumstances in methods that may assist enterprise fashions and in some circumstances in methods that may problem them. We imagine AI is finally going to make accounting companies’ companies higher and extra worthwhile and on the similar time finish purchasers will get higher providers at higher costs," Shah stated.

The accounting occupation, it appears, is about to search out out which facet of that equation it lands on.

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