The generative AI buzz isn’t dying down any time soon, with companies funneling millions into new projects, initiatives and startups aimed at capturing the emerging technology’s potential. “AI native” data platform WEKA, for example, raised $140 million in an oversubscribed Series E funding round this May which vaulted them into unicorn status, with a valuation of $1.6 billion.

However, while the spotlight on generative AI has certainly contributed to an increase in customer demand, it hasn’t changed the startup’s overall goals and strategy, WEKA CFO Intekhab Nazeer said.

Founded in 2013, the startup’s focus since inception has been on solving the data storage and management challenges presented by expanding AI use — “everyone knows that data volumes are going to grow larger and more complicated over time,” and in looking at AI, WEKA made a conscious decision to make “an informed decision to catch that wave in time,” Nazeer said in an interview.

“We wanted to position ourselves in such a way that we can help the customers transit to a more modern AI native data stack,” Nazeer said. “AI-native” refers to enabling workloads that are oriented towards the technology, allowing flexibility between different models and platforms, he said. “That’s what has been the company's focus, that has been the core roadmap.”

Tackling the data question

Spending on AI — and on generative AI solutions in particular — is only expected to grow over the next few years, with Gartner predicting AI software spending will balloon to $297.9 billion in 2027 compared to $124 billion in 2022, CFO Dive previously reported. The market share of such spend going to generative AI is expected to spike to 35% by 2027 as compared to 8% in 2023, Gartner further predicted.

The generative AI boom made this an ideal time for the Campbell, California-based startup to “fortify its cash reserves,” Nazeer said in a statement included in WEKA’s May announcement about its Series E round. In a murky economic environment, one of the few areas where businesses are spending and not cutting costs today is in AI, which is WEKA’s “sweet spot,” he told CFO Dive.

Nazeer has served as WEKA’s CFO since January 2020, according to his LinkedIn profile. Prior to joining the data management startup, he served as CFO for Unifi Software, which was acquired by DELL Boomi in 2020.

Led by Valor Equity Partners with participation from NVIDIA and Qualcomm Ventures, the startup’s latest funding round will help it further execute on its mission of ensuring modern data infrastructure is equipped to handle “AI-oriented workloads,” Nazeer said. The company offers technology that allows companies to streamline their data pipelines, creating more efficient data storage and management. In other words, the goal is to help companies set up to become “AI native” in the same way businesses once made the switch to become “cloud native,” he said.

The cloud is a key part of how Nazeer is looking to drive further growth at WEKA, including working with “hyper-scalers” in the market such as Amazon Web Services and Oracle Cloud Infrastructure as well as with partners in the GPU cloud space.

“So the way I'm looking at Weka’s growth in terms of the top line, is trying to focus on what is relevant to the next 18 to 36 months for the company to get to a $500 million ARR [annual recurring revenue],” Nazeer said.

As companies look to further incorporate AI into their products and workflows, concerns over data — its management, security and quality — have begun to rise in the minds of CFOs and other key decision makers.

While AI models are capable of crunching massive volumes of information, adding bad data into the mix only means companies will receive bad analytics, faster, Michael Polaha, SVP of finance solutions for software provider Blackline previously told CFO Dive. Furthermore, the sheer volume of data AI models are now tasked with managing can represent both cost and security challenges for the business, underscoring the need for solutions that can keep pace.

WEKA’s early start to the AI field gives it an advantage over its competition, many of which are legacy data infrastructure solutions, Nazeer said. For CFOs increasingly tasked with providing deeper and more strategic insight to their businesses, having tools in place that can tackle those challenges is critical.

“I think the CFOs need to make sure they are looking at upcoming tools that embed AI, because that can provide much [deeper] data driven insight and analytics into business decision making,” he said.

Looking under the technology hood  

When examining how AI-driven tools can impact their business, it’s also important for CFOs to make sure they are leaving room for technology to grow and change — taking a multi-year approach to technology adoption is essential, Nazeer said.

For example, many companies may purchase new tools in three- or five-year deals that offer discounts in the moment, “but we might be binding ourselves to a limited technology because AI and technology is changing every day,” he said. “And it might not be the right decision to save some costs and bind ourselves for multiple years into redundant technology.”

Popping the hood on one’s tech stack is also a key first step CFOs need to take when looking at emerging technologies. Finance chiefs should be sure to do an audit of the numerous software solutions and technologies they utilize to ensure there are not phantom software licenses or phantom users, “because it's such a silent siphoning of money that companies don't realize,” he said.