Former Microsoft Execs Launch New Startup

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.