Pipe deploys four AI agents to accelerate small business funding

Fintech firm Pipe has unveiled four artificial intelligence agents designed to automate critical operational tasks, significantly speeding up small business funding processes. The move aims to enhance efficiency and support the company's global expansion efforts.

Operational Automation

Pipe, which provides embedded capital products to small businesses, deployed these AI agents to address specific challenges in:

• Fraud and compliance
• Capital payment management
• Customer engagement
• Finance operations

The new systems are part of Pipe's strategy to scale efficiently without a substantial increase in headcount. The company is currently experiencing strong growth and preparing to enter new markets.

According to Pipe, the AI-driven architecture has already reduced operational timeframes from weeks to near real-time, enabling platform partners to bring solutions to market faster.

The Four AI Agents

1. Fraud and Compliance Agent: Accelerates decision-making by analyzing business data to distinguish between manual errors and actual risks. Pipe expects 90% of applicants to receive decisions within minutes.
2. Recovery Agent: Manages payment restarts for businesses with failed debits by researching business and payment processor statuses.
3. Sales Agent: Provides continuous support across time zones, helping applicants complete capital requests and re-engaging abandoned processes.
4. Treasury Agent: Analyzes global cash positions and makes recommendations on investments, capital capacity, and risk limits.

Company Perspective

"At Pipe, we're focused on using AI where it actually drives better experiences and financial solutions for our partners," said Claurelle Rakipovic, Chief Product Officer at Pipe. "Every agent we've built is replacing manual processes and delighting small businesses with new positive experiences."

Pipe's capital platform, launched in 2023, uses live revenue and transaction data for algorithmic underwriting, avoiding reliance on credit scores or personal guarantees. The company reports that 98% of pre-approved businesses receive their promised funding.

Strategic Alignment

The AI agent launch follows Pipe's recent acquisition of Glean.ai and aligns with its mission to provide small businesses with financial solutions previously available only to larger enterprises. These include:

• Capital
• Card and spend management
• Payment experiences
• AI-powered spend insights

"Pipe remains focused on being an AI-first fintech," Rakipovic added. "With each agent shipped, we're collapsing what used to take weeks of ops into seconds, accelerating our scale 10x."

Pipe's approach embeds these functions into software platforms already used by small businesses, reducing friction and time to value.