Sphere Raises $21M Series A Led by Andreessen Horowitz

Sphere raises $21m Series A from Andreessen Horowitz and launches the world’s first AI-native cross border compliance engine

Sphere, the AI-native cross-border compliance engine, today announced a $21 million Series A, led by Andreessen Horowitz, with participation from Y Combinator and Felicis Ventures. The raise reflects growing demand for scalable tax solutions as companies expand globally earlier than ever and face mounting regulatory complexity.  

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Regulators worldwide are cracking down – EU authorities now require platforms like Stripe and Adyen to report tax evaders, and many countries are moving to real-time digital reporting. Meanwhile, startups are going international faster than ever; a Stripe study shows most sell into 90+ countries by the end of their second year.

Founded by Nicholas Rudder, Sphere began by tackling indirect tax (sales tax, VAT, GST) and has become an indispensable platform for finance teams at global technology businesses including Lovable, Replit, Windsurf, Deel, and Eleven Labs. 

Sphere’s edge comes from two core differentiators: 

• Local rails into 100+ tax authorities: Built over 18 months in stealth, Sphere’s direct integrations with 100+ global tax authorities enable full automation of registration, calculation, filing, and remittance – all on one platform.
• AI-native tax engine: Sphere’s proprietary Tax Review and Assessment Model (TRAM) collects, codifies and monitors global tax law and rates, automating research that legacy vendors still perform manually. TRAM was trained on thousands of hours of feedback from expert tax researchers and still involves experts-in-the-loop to validate outputs and further improve its accuracy.

With this funding, Sphere plans to expand TRAM’s capabilities beyond indirect tax and into areas such as input tax, withholding, e-invoicing, and tariffs, to become a full revenue-based compliance engine.

"Sphere isn’t just another vendor – it’s a scalable platform built for the next era of compliance.” said Marc Andrusko, Partner at Andreessen Horowitz. “Just as Deel redefined global payroll, Sphere is transforming revenue-based compliance. With the right technology, team, and timing, they’re poised to solve indirect tax and broader cross-border compliance on a global scale.”

“Just as Deel redefined global payroll, Sphere is transforming revenue-based compliance.”

This funding announcement follows a period of significant momentum for Sphere, including rapid customer growth, key partnerships and product developments:

• Rapid customer growth: Since emerging from stealth in December 2024, Sphere has signed global customers including Lovable, Eleven Labs, Replit, Windsurf, Heygen, and Deel, with an average monthly revenue growth rate of over 30%.
• Key partnerships: Sphere is one of only three tax vendors globally with a native integration to Stripe’s Billing and Checkout products and is part of the Netsuite SuiteCloud Developer Network. 
• Product developments: Sphere recently announced TRAM’s expansion of indirect tax coverage across physical and intangible goods and services. The company also launched embedded global tax remittance across 100+ regions.

“We were using another tax vendor that outsourced some of their international functionality to a network of local service providers” said Adam Strouss, VP of Finance at Windsurf. “Managing that patchwork of local representatives created a lot of administrative load, incurred significant fees and simply wasn’t scalable. Sphere automates the entire end-to-end compliance process on one platform giving us peace of mind as we scale.”

"Sphere automates the entire end-to-end compliance process on one platform giving us peace of mind as we scale.”

“This funding allows us to accelerate our vision of building the first AI-native cross-border compliance engine," said Nicholas Rudder, Founder of Sphere. "When you think about an area like tax - whether it be indirect tax, withholding tax, tariffs - it’s really just a massive document based problem. The rules are all available online, just in unstructured formats, hard to find places and different languages. Understanding how those rules apply to your business is a problem well suited to AI as long as the right guardrails are in place. Our scalable research and true international capabilities keep customers compliant, saving them time and money, and unlocking new markets. Sphere makes selling globally as easy as selling locally.”

To learn more about how Sphere can benefit your organization, visit https://www.getsphere.com/

About Sphere

Sphere is an AI-powered cross-border compliance platform. It helps companies like Lovable, Replit, Deel and Eleven Labs automate sales tax, VAT, and GST obligations. With direct integrations into 100+ tax authorities worldwide, Sphere delivers true end-to-end automation – from registration to filing and remittance. Its proprietary AI-native tax engine continuously codifies and monitors global tax law, giving finance teams scalable compliance without manual research. Sphere can be deployed in under 24 hours, integrates seamlessly with existing finance stacks, and offers 24/7 Slack-based support. For more information, visit getsphere.com or explore career opportunities at jobs.ashbyhq.com/sphere.