2 days Ago By [email protected] (Alistair Houghton)
An AI- powered software firm founded “over pizza and beers” has won an investment from the venture capital arm of professional services group Dow Schofield Watts. DSW Ventures is making a pre-seed investment of £415,000 into Manchester-based Fireflai, which aims to help its clients to analyse and understand “fragmented and inconsistent product data”. Fireflai was founded by Tom Gardner and Craig Sumner and works with manufacturers, distributors and retailers who need to bring together product data from many different sources, systems and supplies.
Its technology uses “advanced data science and AI” to bring each customer’s fragmented information together into one single comprehensive dataset. Mr Gardner cofounded Robiquity, a successful automation consultancy bought-out by Growth Capital Partners, while digital process transformation specialist Mr Sumner has led Fireflai’s development of its core platform. Laura Malins, former chief product officer of Manchester unicorn Matillion, works with the team on a non-executive basis.
Tom Garder, CEO of Fireflai, said: “This investment marks a huge milestone for me personally and for our business. Craig and I started the business over pizza and beers in 2023, and it’s great to see our vision come to fruition and very quickly add real value to our clients. “DSW Ventures has worked incredibly closely with us on developing our business plan, refining our product strategy and developing our team.
We are extremely excited about the next chapter for Fireflai – building on our early promise to create yet another successful Manchester technology company.” Keith Benson, partner at DSW Ventures, said: “Fireflai’s blend of commercial and product expertise, alongside a compelling customer proposition, immediately stood out to us. We are very confident that Fireflai’s will transform how product-centric companies will manage their data, addressing a critical pain point.
We would like to congratulate Tom, Craig and their team it’s been a privilege to work with them on this investment.”.
