Skrooge.ai: Closes $1.85M Seed Funding to Scale AI Accounting

Skrooge.ai targets fast-growing SME market as corporate tax compliance drives demand for automated financial operations

When the UAE introduced its first-ever corporate tax in 2023, hundreds of thousands of small business owners faced an unfamiliar problem: their books were a mess, and the Federal Tax Authority was watching.

Skrooge.ai, a Dubai-based startup combining artificial intelligence with human accountants, has raised $1.85m in seed funding to meet that demand. The round, completed through SAFE notes from fintech-experienced angel investors, will fund hiring across product and engineering while expanding delivery capacity for UAE-based SMEs.

The timing is deliberate. The country’s 9% corporate tax caught many entrepreneurs off guard, and a federal e-invoicing mandate arrives in July 2026. More than 70,500 new companies registered in Dubai last year alone. Most lack the resources for full-time finance staff but cannot afford compliance failures.

“Our goal is simple: to save founders and business owners their time, money, and sanity from unnecessary stress, so they wake up excited to build,” said Anatolii Solomanin, Co-CEO and Chief Product Officer of skrooge.ai.

The numbers tell the story. The UAE was home to roughly 557,000 SMEs as of mid-2022, according to the Ministry of Economy. That figure is projected to hit 1 million by 2030. The cloud accounting software market is expected to grow from $33bn in 2025 to nearly $67bn by the decade’s end, a compound annual growth rate of approximately 15%. Traditional outsourced accounting in the UAE costs between AED1,000 and AED5,000 monthly for small businesses. Hiring in-house runs AED9,000 or more. Skrooge.ai is positioning itself in the gap: cheaper than a dedicated accountant, more reliable than software alone.

The company launched paid services in July 2025. Within six months, it had onboarded 150 clients and reached $300,000 in annualized recurring revenue. Customers range from freelancers and solo founders to restaurants, fitness studios, real estate agents, and family offices operating across mainland UAE and free zones including DMCC, JAFZA, DIFC, and ADGM.

What distinguishes skrooge.ai from pure software plays like Xero or QuickBooks is the human layer. The platform automates the tedious work: connecting to email inboxes, bank feeds, and ERP systems to pull invoices, receipts, and statements. Machine learning categorizes transactions and flags inconsistencies. But certified accountants review every output before anything reaches the Federal Tax Authority. This hybrid approach addresses a gap that neither traditional accounting firms nor self-service software have managed to fill. Business owners want accuracy and compliance without spending hours reconciling spreadsheets or chasing receipts. They also want someone accountable when things go wrong.

“Many people don’t realize that the filing process heavily relies on accurate financial reports,” Solomanin wrote in a recent company blog post. “If they are not tax-compliant, it will surface very easily during an FTA audit and could result in heavy penalties.”

The skrooge.ai platform tracks VAT and corporate tax positions in real time, generates profit and loss breakdowns, and produces cash flow analysis. Clients see dashboards showing what is done, what is pending, and when deadlines approach. The company claims its approach can cut costs by half compared with typical outsourced firms while reducing the risk of fines. For entrepreneurs who have been burned by cheap bookkeepers or missed filing deadlines, that promise carries weight.

The five-person founding team built skrooge.ai on experience from both sides of the finance table. Solomanin spent a decade in financial and data analysis at Big Four firms and venture capital funds, including board observer roles at technology companies such as Uolo and CollegeDekho. He studied at the London School of Economics and brings a granular understanding of what investors and auditors expect from financial reporting. Vlad Sharuda, who leads growth, previously served as Chief Marketing Officer at Osome, a Singapore-based accounting platform that raised $51m and expanded to serve more than 15,000 businesses across Asia and Europe. He saw firsthand how automation could transform back-office operations for SMEs and understood the playbook for scaling in fragmented markets.

Kirill Blokhnin, Co-CEO for operations, optimized processes at a retail chain with more than 150 locations before joining the venture. Artem Savytskyi, the CTO, built high-load software architecture at companies including WisePPC and Takamol Holding. Kyrylo Chernov leads AI development, focusing on scalable automation and intelligent document processing. The backgrounds matter. Skrooge.ai is not a software company pretending to understand accounting. It is a team that has managed thousands of tax filings, supported more than 100 audits, and worked with complex structures including multi-entity groups, free zone arrangements, and transfer pricing scenarios.

The UAE has moved aggressively to formalize its business environment in recent years. Golden visas attract entrepreneurs from around the world. Full foreign ownership is now permitted across most sectors. But with opportunity comes scrutiny. FTA audits have increased in frequency and rigour. Penalties for non-compliance can reach 50% of unpaid tax. For a solo founder running an e-commerce store or a consultant juggling clients across three free zones, the administrative burden is real. Many have cobbled together cheap bookkeepers and last-minute tax advisors, only to discover that poor records create expensive problems down the line.

Skrooge.ai is betting that business owners will pay a modest premium for peace of mind. The company prices by transaction volume, scaling with client growth rather than locking in fixed fees. Every document is reviewed for tax compliance before filing. Every deadline is tracked automatically. The model appeals to founders who want to focus on their core business rather than worrying about whether their VAT return will trigger an audit.

The seed funding gives skrooge.ai runway to hire engineers and accountants, deepen its AI capabilities, and absorb more of the UAE’s growing SME population. The company has not disclosed specific client targets but has signaled ambitions beyond its current base. With regulatory complexity increasing and new businesses forming at record pace, the addressable market continues to expand.

The investment is among the early venture-backed rounds in the UAE’s AI accounting sector. It reflects a broader bet: that the Gulf’s entrepreneurial boom will create sustained demand for technology that makes compliance painless rather than punitive. For now, the company remains focused on execution.

“We don’t just bookkeep,” Solomanin has said. “We sit with you and design the chart of accounts together, so every line in your P&L actually reflects how your business works.”

In a market flooded with generic software and overworked accountants, skrooge.ai is offering something different: financial operations that scale with the business, backed by people who understand what founders actually need.

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