Warp, a New York-based HR and payroll automation startup, announced it has raised $18 million in Series A funding, bringing its total funding to $24 million. The round was led by Sound Ventures, with participation from Y Combinator, HOF Capital, SV Angel, Homebrew Capital, and several high-profile angels including Dropbox co-founders Drew Houston and Arash Ferdowsi, Cruise founder Kyle Vogt, and operators from OpenAI, Brex, and more.

From “Payroll Software” to “Autonomous Back-Office Infrastructure”

Founded by Ayush Sharma (CEO) and Adam Rankin (CTO), Warp is not just building another payroll tool — it’s engineering an AI-native platform designed to automate the most painful, manual backend workflows in startups: payroll, tax compliance, benefits setup, and onboarding.

Warp uses AI agents to automate multi-state tax registrations, unemployment insurance, workers' compensation, new hire reporting, and more. What previously required hours or even days of founder time now takes just 30 seconds on Warp. The company’s internal data shows a 10x decrease in filing time, 80% reduction in error rates, and 90%+ cost savings compared to legacy providers.

This automation-first approach enables Warp to manage compliance for over 380 companies with just one part-time contractor, in stark contrast to competitors like Gusto, which rely heavily on large manual operations teams.

Strategic Wedge: Multi-State Payroll Compliance

Since 2020, 50% of new startups hire across multiple states from day one—a trend up 3x from pre-pandemic levels. Legacy payroll systems, originally designed for single-state operations, are breaking under this new complexity.

Warp addresses this challenge directly. By focusing on AI-powered multi-state payroll compliance, the company has found a powerful wedge into startup back-office infrastructure. Once embedded into a company’s compliance stack, Warp becomes mission-critical.

Rapid Product Expansion and Go-to-Market Execution

Warp claims to have built more functionality in 1.5 years than Gusto did in 12 years. Beyond core payroll and benefits, Warp is now expanding into expenses, time tracking, contractor management, and compensation benchmarking. Features like Okta SSO, organizational charts, and global onboarding are planned in the next 6 months.

This engineering velocity is enabled by Warp’s lean, AI-enhanced product team that leverages tools like Claude and Cursor to ship faster, with less overhead.

The Vision: An Autonomous Back Office

Warp’s long-term vision is to create the first autonomous back-office platform, where operations don’t just get tracked — they get executed. This means no manual workflows, no bottlenecks, and no scaling limitations.

“We’re building the AI-native infrastructure startups actually need — tools that think, decide, and act,” said CEO Ayush Sharma. “Founders shouldn’t have to deal with government portals, tax codes, or error-prone compliance systems. We’re automating it all.”

The Market Opportunity

According to Warp, the convergence of several key trends has created the ideal moment for disruption:

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  Remote work has dramatically increased state-level tax complexity

  
  


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  LLMs can now parse government forms and navigate regulatory systems with 99%+ accuracy

  
  


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  Fintech APIs have eliminated infrastructure barriers to entry

  
  


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  Modern founders expect consumer-grade speed and UX from enterprise tools

  
  

Warp aims to become the trusted back-office layer for the next generation of startups — companies that operate leaner, scale faster, and expect their systems to run with minimal human touch.

About Warp

Warp is building the future of automated operations for startups. The company provides a unified platform that handles HR, payroll, tax compliance, onboarding, global payments, and more — all powered by AI agents. Warp supports payroll in all 50 U.S. states and global contractors in 150+ countries.

The team includes former operators from OpenAI, Dropbox, Brex, and other top startups. Warp is headquartered in New York City, with an 8,000 sq ft Flatiron office and is currently hiring across engineering, GTM, and customer success roles.