Irish tech startup Assiduous has announced a €1 million funding round and the launch of its flagship product, the Corporate Finance Autopilot, a virtual corporate finance advisory platform powered by the latest advances in AI.
The company, headquartered at NovaUCD in Dublin, aims to reshape how small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) engage with capital markets. The oversubscribed round was backed by seasoned business owners, executives, and Enterprise Ireland’s High-Potential Start-Up (HPSU) programme, underlining investor confidence in Assiduous’ mission to modernise and democratise corporate finance.
With fresh funding secured, Assiduous plans to accelerate the development of its AI-native platform through 2025 and 2026, expanding its technical and product teams to push the boundaries of applied AI in capital markets.
The company also intends to recruit top-tier engineering and AI talent, with a particular focus on agentic AI, a branch of AI focused on autonomous agents capable of complex reasoning and goal completion.
Strategic collaborations and EU backing
Assiduous’ recent participation in the EIT Digital Open Innovation Factory 2024, a co-funded EU programme, has bolstered its position in the European innovation landscape. As a result, the Irish startup has entered into a strategic collaboration with Euronext Group, Europe’s leading exchange operator.
This collaboration aims to make public markets more accessible to SMEs much earlier in their lifecycle. With Euronext’s reach and Assiduous’ intelligent advisory engine, the partnership has the potential to transform how companies prepare for IPOs and other strategic transactions.
Being part of EIT Digital’s Equity Portfolio ensures ongoing access to Europe’s innovation stakeholders, resources, and strategic mentorship, key drivers for scale in the competitive fintech and capital markets space.
A founder-led vision for smarter corporate finance
Founded in 2023 by experienced investment bankers Fergal Meegan and Barry Murphy, Assiduous draws on deep capital markets experience combined with a forward-thinking approach to technology. From its base at NovaUCD, Assiduous is setting out to democratise financial advisory, removing the friction, cost, and exclusivity from traditional corporate finance and replacing it with smart, scalable technology that’s always on and always learning.
At the core of Assiduous’ offering is the Corporate Finance Autopilot, an AI-native SaaS solution designed to support SMEs through every stage of their corporate lifecycle, from early strategic planning to financing rounds, liquidity events, and beyond.
Unlike traditional financial advisory services, which can be costly and inaccessible to many small businesses, Corporate Finance Autopilot offers persistent, high-quality guidance that is digitally streamlined and powered by AI. This virtual advisory system uses agentic AI capable of autonomous reasoning and planning to provide businesses with intelligent, actionable support previously reserved for larger firms with access to expensive financial advisors.
By combining proprietary business processes with the latest machine learning models, Assiduous empowers SMEs to stay transaction-ready, allowing them to efficiently engage with capital markets, raise funds, or pursue strategic exits.
What’s next?
As capital markets increasingly intersect with AI, Assiduous stands out by offering not just a tool but a revolutionary financial co-pilot for SMEs. With backing from public and private partners and a bold AI-first roadmap, the company is positioning itself as a game-changer in the future of corporate finance.
Fergal Meegan, Chief Executive Officer, Assiduous, said, “Businesses are at a pivotal moment in the application of technology to the provision of professional services. We are only scratching the surface with the value that can be created for business owners from leveraging AI to do more with less. Assiduous is focused on embedding corporate advisory domain expertise at the application layer to unlock the power of foundation models for many more small and medium sized business owners seeking to contemplate, plan and execute high value corporate actions.”
Conor O’Donovan, Head of Start-ups at Enterprise Ireland, said, “Assiduous is an excellent example of a forward-thinking Irish start-up that is using cutting-edge technology to address a massive unmet market need. The company’s growth plans aligns with Enterprise Ireland’s new five-year strategy Delivering for Ireland, Leading Globally, with a key objective to support and enable SMEs to engage with the start-up ecosystem, to execute financing and strategic transactions and to grow the next generation of Irish multinational corporations.”
Dénes Csiszár, Interim Head of Acceleration and Growth at EIT Digital, said, “We are pleased that we could provide financial support for Assiduous at a formative stage in its evolution. We are excited about Assiduous’ prospects to solve some of Europe’s critical strategic and financing challenges for SMEs using the latest artificial intelligence innovations. We look forward to witnessing Assiduous’ progress in the coming years as a as a champion for European SMEs and as a shareholder.”
