Tailor, a startup erp “ headless ”, brings $ 22 million to series A

TailorA Business Resources Planning Platform (ERP), based in San Francisco and Tokyo, has raised $ 22 million in a series of financing for the A series. Investors include ANRI, the JIC Venture Growth Investments (JIC VGI), the New Enterprise Associates (NEA), Spiral Capital and Y Combinator.

ERP systems are generally delivered with a single interface that includes all the necessary functions, but this can be inflexible and restrict customization options. On the other hand, an “headless” ERP system separates the frontal (User Interface) from the back-End (ERP Core), told Techcrunch, co-founder and CEO of Tailor, Yo Shibata. The back-end manages the key functions of the ERP system, such as stock management and accounting, allowing an independent selection or development of the front.

This configuration allows the tailor system, Omakase, Allow the AI ​​agents to securely access its ERP system via API to automate tasks such as the summary of customer history or the triggering of workflows, he added.

The industry has many competitors, including giant inherited companies such as SAP and Oracle, as well as vertical SaaS tools like Crater and Stitch. Shibata believes that Tailor’s position as an “headless”, highly customizable option will give it a competitive advantage.

“As coding becomes more and more commodity and AI agents manage more operational charges – already around 50% and moving around 90% – companies want systems that can be composed, not hard,” said Shibata. “We believe that the future of the ERP is modular, programmable and designed for a world where humans and machines collaborate transparently.”

Tailor’s product, available in the United States and Japan, was originally targeted from retail and electronic sales customers, as these industries are faced with specific challenges resulting from dynamic supply chains, market expansion and uncertain geopolitical factors, Shibata at Techcrunch told Techcrunch. Omakase automates workflows and manages business operations such as stocks, achievement, finance, purchase and management of omnicaneous.

But the company now receives a high volume of requests for requests from other sectors such as B2B and also widens its services to non-commerce companies or retail, said Shibata.

“B2B operations are much more complex than B2C companies, because they involve not only selling stocks, but also to manage future orders, advanced orders, and even more,” said Shibata. “(They) could want to personalize some of their product ranges, which will then add more complexity to the operational side.”

Shibata, former McKinsey serial consultant and entrepreneur, and Misato Takahashi, CTO, founded Tailor in 2021. The startup increased to around 50 employees in Japan, the United States and several other countries from today, against only 10 in 2022.

As for its long-term plan, the CEO said: “Rather than offering a rigid and all-in-one suite, we provide a modular platform and first for API that companies can assemble and adapt to meet their exact needs, similar to the way Shopify takes care of both pre-construit stores and others to treat it as a back and construction or construction tools. Unique model – It is to give teams the flexibility of the scale and the personalization of the ERP around their own workflows and tools. »»

The 4-year startup plans to allocate the product through three key priorities: the expansion of the United States, product development and Japan operations.

“We speed up the expansion of the United States by creating a dedicated marketing team and deepening our presence among medium-sized and business customers,” Shibata in Techcrunch told. “Secondly, we are massively investing in the development of products – in particular to extend our ERP modules and our AI capacities. Third, we will continue to set up our Japanese operations, where we already have a strong traction of the market, by expanding our customer delivery and success teams to support growth. ”