Financial automation startup Dost has entered the UK market after closing a £6 million Series A round led by Octopus Ventures, marking the company’s biggest expansion since its founding.
The round also brought in new investor TQ Ventures, with continued support from Draper B1, Born Capital, and Eoniq.fund.
Founded in 2021 by Adam Barbera, Fernando Martín, Naqqash Abassi, and Àlex Caudet, Dost builds AI systems that handle complex back-office work for mid-sized companies—specifically the slow, error-prone processes around supplier paperwork and financial operations.
From Spain to the UK: A Bigger Market Ready for Automation
Over the past three years, Dost trained its proprietary AI on millions of European financial documents, fine-tuning the system to handle messy, multi-page invoices across industries such as manufacturing, logistics, construction, automotive, and food processing.
“UK companies wrestle with the exact same operational bottlenecks we’ve been solving on the continent,” said CEO Adam Barbera. “What’s different is the scale of demand. British enterprises are actively looking for automation that’s already proven in production.”
The endorsement from Octopus Ventures, he noted, signals confidence that Dost’s approach translates well into the UK’s fast-moving finance and operations landscape.
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AI Built In-House — Not Borrowed from OCR Vendors
Unlike many invoice-processing solutions that layer software on top of third-party OCR engines, Dost designed its own generative AI stack from scratch. That allows the platform to:
- parse multi-line, multi-currency, multi-page transactional documents,
- automate procure-to-pay and order-to-cash workflows end-to-end,
- and integrate directly with ERP systems across Europe.
The company says this technical depth is what makes it particularly effective for manufacturers, suppliers, and logistics operators—sectors where paperwork is both voluminous and notoriously inconsistent.
Early UK Pilots Show Momentum
Dost has already been quietly onboarding manufacturing, construction, transport, and automotive customers in the UK. These pilots helped shape the company’s expansion strategy, which now includes a newly formed London-based commercial team focused on sales, marketing, and customer success.
The startup is currently used by 150+ European enterprises, replacing manual invoice handling, reducing data-entry errors, and accelerating approval cycles.
The fresh capital will support:
- deeper product development,
- expansion of its Spanish engineering hub,
- and rapid scaling inside the UK market.
About Dost
Dost builds AI-native automation tools that eliminate manual work across the accounts payable function. By capturing financial documents, extracting data with proprietary models, and connecting directly into ERP systems, the platform reduces errors, accelerates approvals, and streamlines operations for mid-market companies in industries such as manufacturing, construction, retail, and logistics.
