For startups, pre-seed to Series B
Your finance team, AI-native from day one.
Bookkeeping, accounting, tax compliance and your CFO: one team, one set of numbers, built for startups.
Agentic AI does the work. Our experts sign off on every number. See the one financial stack →
45-day free trial. No credit card. No long-term commitment. Trials start with a 30-minute kickoff call.
1. Book
Pick a 30-minute slot
2. Connect
Share access to your finance stack
3. Go Live
Decision-ready outputs in 2 business days
One team. One set of numbers. One monthly price.
Your bookkeeper, CPA and CFO work from the same books, so nobody reconciles three versions of the truth before a board meeting.
Bookkeeping
Monthly close and reconciliations, done on time every month.
Learn more →2Accounting
GAAP financial statements and accrual books that hold up in diligence.
Learn more →3Tax & compliance
Federal and state returns, Delaware franchise tax, and deadlines tracked in all 50 states.
Learn more →4CFO
Runway, forecasts, board packs and fundraising support from the same team.
Learn more →Books and tax start on Launch. CFO support starts on Foundation, and a full fractional CFO comes with Growth. Compare plans
Trusted by Bay Area startups from pre-seed to Series B across SaaS, fintech, healthcare, and AI
The Three Stages of Strategic Finance
Most founders never get to strategic finance. They get stuck at the books.
Every finance function moves through three stages. Most companies never get past the first. Pick your stage. See exactly what you need, and the plan that fits.
One team, CFO judgment included
Cheap AI bookkeeping stops at the ledger. Many startup firms sell CFO work as a separate product, or only take companies that have already raised, and enterprise firms are built for audits. StartupCFO is one team for pre-seed to Series B: the team that closes your books also prepares your returns and builds your board materials, from the same numbers, with CFO support in your plan from $349/mo. Why we built it this way
Built for founders at every stage of the problem
Scaling Fast
You’re moving quickly and thinking big. Get the Financial Intelligence, modeling, and planning in place now, so growth decisions are backed by data, not gut feel.
Just Closed a Round
Investors expect clean books and regular reporting. Get board-ready financials in place before the first board meeting, not scrambling months later.
Paying for Bookkeeping, Still Flying Blind
A monthly P&L isn’t enough. You need proactive alerts, Spend Guardrails, and a finance team that actually understands your business.
Board Wants Numbers You Can’t Produce
Board packs and cash forecasts shouldn’t take a week to assemble. Board packs generated in minutes; a clean diligence process is never more than 2 business days away.
Why StartupCFO
Intelligence, Not Just Historical Numbers
Most founders scatter their finance across bookkeepers, tax preparers, and messy spreadsheets. They get reports on where the money went, but never the clarity to decide where it should go.
StartupCFO replaces the fragmented approach with an AI-native finance stack built for startups, unifying accounting with strategic finance to deliver intelligence, not just historical numbers.
AI does the heavy lifting. An accountant signs off on every number, because your numbers can’t hallucinate.
Unified System
Replaces the need to manage bookkeepers, CPAs, and CFOs separately.
Financial Intelligence
Moves beyond backward-looking accounting to forward-looking strategy.
Better Decisions
On-demand insights so you know exactly where your capital should be deployed.
Efficiency
One bundled monthly fee, live in 2 business days, no hourly billing within your allowance. The finance function without the finance headcount.
Cost
$2K-$5K/mo for CPAs, $12K-$21K/mo in-house
One bundled monthly fee sized to your stage, no hourly billing within your allowance
Your Team
Shared pool or single point of failure
Accountant + CPA in every plan, fractional CFO on higher tiers
Time to Go Live
2-4 weeks for CPAs, 3-6 months for in-house
2 business days from sign-up to live decisions
Beyond Bookkeeping
Bookkeeping-first, CFO strategy as an upsell
AI agents draft, humans sign off; bookkeeper + CPA in every plan, full CFO and MCP on Growth
Stop guessing your runway. Start making data-driven financial decisions.
Agentic AI · Reviewed by Experts
Meet ClariFi Decision Engine
ClariFi replaces fragmented spreadsheets with financial clarity you can act on: always-current intelligence, proactive alerts, and answers in plain English validated by your team. And ClariFi is agentic: AI agents draft your close, watch your burn, and categorize your books on their own schedule, with a human signing off before anything reaches you. On Growth, connect your own AI assistant over MCP and query your numbers directly; anything it proposes to change waits for your team to approve.
ClariFi delivers always-current intelligence, proactive alerts, and expert-reviewed insights. It is included with the Growth plan, and available as an add-on on Foundation.
Behind it: one connected system where accountants reconcile, AI drafts, and experts review before anything reaches you. See how the stack fits together →
Works with your existing stack: native syncs plus accountant-reconciled systems
What We Deliver
Everything you need to know where your startup stands, and where it's headed, powered by ClariFi, with accountant sign-off on every output.
Board Pack Generator
Always-on monthly board packs with executive narrative, KPI summaries, and Q&A prep, generated in minutes, reviewed by your finance team.
Ask ClariFi
Ask any financial question in plain English and get an answer grounded strictly in your own data, with a source citation on every number and your team adding context before delivery.
Planning & Modeling
Sixteen planning tools on one always-current set of numbers: model fundraising scenarios, test burn assumptions, and see exactly when you need to raise, with confidence intervals, not guesswork.
Investor-Ready
Data rooms, fundraising readiness scores, and cap table analysis so you’re always 2 business days from a clean due diligence process.
Spend Guardrails
Safe-to-spend signals, budget exception alerts, and approval workflows that keep the burn rate on plan, not just tracked, but controlled.
Tax & Compliance Autopilot
Tax estimates, R&D credit screening, and compliance deadline tracking with CPA sign-off: the deadlines are watched, you don’t have to think about them.
From Our Clients
“StartupCFO gave us a finance team that feels in-house: ClariFi Decision Engine, a CFO who actually knows our numbers, and we were due-diligence ready in weeks, not months.”
Devi Malladi
Founder & CEO, BlazeOps.AI
Cloud Operations · Seed Stage
$36K+/yr saved vs. full-time hire
“Anyone can pull numbers into a spreadsheet once. The difference is having a system that keeps your metrics current so you can actually be data-driven when choosing the right path for growth.”
Naveen R.
Co-Founder & CTO, Stealth Startup
Enterprise SaaS · Pre-Seed
120+ hours saved in Year 1
2 Business Days
From sign-up to live decisions
One Flat Fee
vs. $2K-$5K/mo for a CPA firm
MCP-ready
Bring your numbers to your AI
Concrete Commitments
Our Promises to You
2 Business Days
From sign-up to go-live
Connect your accounts and we handle the rest. Your finance system is operational within 2 business days.
Same Day
Response time guaranteed
Questions answered via email the same business day. Your team is always accessible.
45 KPIs
Powering every decision
Financial metrics across 8 categories feed ClariFi: board packs, Spend Guardrails, and Tax & Compliance Autopilot all run on the same always-current numbers.
Not Ready to Engage Yet?
DIY With Our Free Resources
Running your own books for now? Everything we teach is free: deep guides, working templates, and calculators built for founders doing it themselves. No signup walls, no strings.
Articles & Guides
Deep dives on taxes, fundraising, accounting, and CFO strategy, written by our team.
Knowledge Base
240+ quick-hit decks covering every startup finance concept, five slides at a time.
Free Tools
Runway, burn, SAFE conversion, valuation, R&D credit, and more: 15 calculators and quizzes.
Templates
Nine formula-driven spreadsheets: budget, model, cap table, board pack, 13-week forecast.
Workshops & Webinars
Free live sessions: the Founder Finance Bootcamp for cohorts and monthly webinars for everyone.
Need a term decoded? The finance glossary covers 170+ startup finance terms in plain English.
We also point founders to the canonical external resources: YC's Startup Library, YC's standard documents, Sequoia's founder articles, and Carta's equity resources. And when you are ready for a finance team, you know where we are.
Startup CFO questions, answered
What is a startup CFO?
A startup CFO, or chief financial officer, owns the numbers that decide what a startup does next: runway and burn, the financial model, board reporting, fundraising, and the pricing and hiring calls that follow from them. Before Series B it is usually a fractional role, because the strategic work arrives years before there is a full-time job's worth of it.
The CFO role for startups, by stage →What do startup CFO services include at StartupCFO?
One team covers the whole finance function: bookkeeping and the monthly close, tax and compliance tracking, and CFO work such as cash forecasting, board packs, financial modeling, and fundraising support, all on ClariFi. Foundation includes CFO support with a fair-use allowance of about 1 hour a month, and Growth includes a full fractional CFO with about 3 hours a month, along with board packs, financial modeling, and fundraising support.
Fractional CFO services →How much does a startup CFO cost?
A full-time startup CFO typically costs $200K to $400K a year in total compensation, and a standalone fractional CFO retainer usually runs $4K to $10K a month. StartupCFO plans run $199 to $799 a month and bundle bookkeeping and tax compliance with the platform, adding CFO time on Foundation and Growth.
Startup CFO salary by stage →When does a startup need a full-time chief financial officer?
Usually around Series B, when multiple entities, a first audit, and continuous capital work add up to a daily job. Before that, most startups get more from a fractional CFO paired with a bookkeeper and a CPA, and hire full-time when the volume of the work, not its importance, justifies it.
When to hire a CFO →Explore what we do
One team covers all of it. Each part is explained in full on its own page.
Get Back to Building. We'll Handle the Numbers.
Your finance team is ready. Book a call today and be live in 2 business days.
45-day free trial · No credit card needed · No long-term commitment
Add-ons available: R&D Tax Credit studies (Growth or Custom Projects) · 409A Valuation coordination · Founder Tax Returns
Built for venture-backed startups. Running a non-venture-scale business? Rubric Financial provides one financial stack for you.
Not ready to talk? Grab our free checklist first.
The Startup Finance Readiness Checklist: 40+ action items from pre-seed to Series A.
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