Accounting software isn’t usually considered the most thrilling type of tech product, but startup Campfire, which offers a general ledger enterprise resource planning (ERP) platform with a user-friendly interface, has an origin story to rival other trendy startups.

Bay Area-based? AI-enabled? Fast-growing? VC-backed? Check, check, check, and check. Founded in 2023, Campfire now has hundreds of clients, including unicorns like vibe coding platform Replit and conversational AI company Decagon. This year, Campfire raised $100 million in two nearly back-to-back Series A and Series B rounds.

John Glasgow, its founder, CEO, and CFO, recently spoke with CFO Brew about fundraising, how he balances his dual roles, and why Campfire’s positioned for growth.

Solving “broken” accounting software. Glasgow developed Campfire because he felt that accounting software could be much better. He had worked in finance for years before becoming a founder, as director of finance and strategy at Adobe and vice president of business development and partnerships at AR company Invoice2go, which he helped sell to Bill.com in 2021, and then joined Bill.com as VP of business development. His experiences showed him “how broken core accounting was,” he said, with monthly cycles requiring a great deal of manual work.

Campfire “was born out of his own experience and frustration,” investor John Locke, partner at venture capital firm Accel, said. “I think that’s how a lot of great companies are born, out of that same dynamic.”

In 2023, Glasgow applied to startup accelerator Y Combinator, which has helped launch around 5,000 companies, including such heavyweights as Airbnb, DoorDash, Dropbox, and Reddit. His application consisted of a lightweight web app with a “full three statement model in Google Sheets.” He was on parental leave from Bill.com for the birth of his daughter when he learned he’d been accepted. He never went back, instead devoting himself to launching Campfire.

Keep reading for more details on how he did it.—CV

A home without a solid foundation risks severe structural damage. Experts, including Scott Rottmann, president of consulting services at professional services firm RGP, warn of the same risks for companies with big AI ambitions but weak “enterprise foundations” to build upon.

CFOs, who can find themselves at the center of their firms’ AI-fueled transformations, need to patch up foundational cracks that may come from poor data quality, technology limitations, or worker-related challenges, according to experts.

A new survey from professional services firm RGP of 200 US-based CFOs found that just 14% said they see a “substantial” return on their AI investments today, although two-thirds expect “clear, measurable impact” within two years. This is clearly a CFO problem: Roughly half of survey respondents said they’re “ultimately responsible” for ensuring a return on their organizations’ AI investments.

“CFOs are emerging as the orchestrators of enterprise transformation, but turning AI’s promise into performance requires strengthening the systems, data, and talent that make AI scale with confidence,” RGP’s Rottmann said in a statement.

Laying an AI-ready foundation. Before implementing AI, CFOs must “zoom out and see where you need help, where you see the problem,” according to Hrishikesh Pippadipally, partner and CIO at accounting firm Wiss.

Keep reading here.—AZ