Ande emerged from stealth on 22 September with more than $52 million in combined seed and Series A funding to build AI agents for corporate entertainment booking, the company said in its funding announcement. Ande says more than 60 enterprises use its platform, moving over $400 million in entertainment spending through it each year.
Key points
- Lightspeed, Redpoint, Duration Ventures and Sierra Ventures invested, with Bain Capital Ventures participating, Ande says.
- Ande says its agents handle venue searches, bookings, approvals, contracts, payments and expense reconciliation.
- Customers report savings of 12 to 15 percent, according to Ande.
- Ande says its network covers more than 93,000 venues across more than 90 cities.
Lightspeed and Redpoint back Ande’s funding
Ande named Lightspeed Venture Partners, Redpoint Ventures, Duration Ventures and Sierra Ventures as investors in the seed and Series A financing, alongside participant Bain Capital Ventures. Pulse 2.0 reported that the money will support expansion of the technology platform and the network connecting companies with entertainment providers.
Ande was founded in 2023 by Lohit Sarma and Michael McDermott, Wowtale reported. Sarma, its chief executive, previously co-founded Lifion by ADP and served as its vice-president of product and technology. He has also held roles at ADP, Solartab and Jugnoo, according to the publication.
The nearest spend-management comparison in the supplied reporting is Ramp. Wowtale reported that Ramp raised $750 million at a $44 billion valuation in June 2026. Ramp operates across expense categories, while Ande concentrates on entertainment bookings, venue inventory and the associated contracts, the publication reported.
Ande estimates that enterprises spend $325 billion a year on entertainment, including client dinners, team outings, catering, sporting events and gifts. Its pitch to corporate buyers centres on bringing the booking process and the subsequent financial work into one system. The company says those activities are commonly spread across credit cards, accounts payable systems and consumer applications.
Ande’s agents handle bookings and reconciliation
Ande says its software finds available venues, books events, sends requests for approval, handles contracts and reconciles expenses. Employees arranging events and the managers approving them work in a shared workspace, according to the company. Ande says its agents then move requests through signing and payment, while finance and legal teams can oversee spending and contracts.
Executive assistants, office managers and field marketers are among the employees Ande identifies as users. The company says its customers include Cloudflare, Salesforce, McGraw Hill and Netskope, as well as Navan, Sigma Computing and Monday.com. It puts the annual entertainment spending passing through the platform at more than $400 million and says customers report savings of 12 to 15 percent.
Netskope’s director of corporate events, Vicky Chung, said in Ande’s announcement that her team uses the platform to follow events as they progress. “My team is now focused on reaching the executives that matter and scaling the program vs. worrying about the logistics,” Chung said. Her account concerns the events team’s work rather than a quantified saving.
Ande chief executive Sarma said the company spent two and a half years working with venues to digitise their information and train models and agents for enterprise entertainment tasks. Venue information matters to both sides of the platform: corporate users search for places to hold events, while providers use Ande to receive and manage bookings, according to the company.
Ande connects buyers with 93,000 venues
Ande says its network contains more than 93,000 entertainment venues across more than 90 cities. It separately identifies 1,600 hospitality venues as partners. The platform gives providers a way to market to corporate buyers, communicate with them and transact through the same network used by enterprise customers, the company says.
Those partners include Altamarea Group, Che Fico, Gracious Hospitality, JKS and The Mina Group, according to Ande. The company also names Nobu, Tao Group Hospitality and Wolfgang Puck among its hospitality partners.
