Thoughtful AI launched in 2020 to automate payment processes for businesses across all industries, like manufacturing, legal, and real estate. But two years later, the startup realized its tech was giving customers the best value in one industry above all others — healthcare.
“We just didn’t see the ROI except for in healthcare,” Thoughtful AI cofounder and CEO Alex Zekoff said. “Those customers were expanding, they needed help, and it was so obvious looking at the data that that was where our product-market fit was, and everything else was a distraction.”
The startup, formerly called Thoughtful Automation, dropped its non-healthcare clients to sell only to midmarket healthcare companies that provide services like behavioral health and dental care.
Now, it’s raised fresh cash to deploy its new AI agents to more healthcare clinics across the US.
The Austin, Texas-based startup just grabbed $20 million in Series A funding, led by Drive Capital and including TriplePoint Capital.
Thoughtful AI is also announcing its first three AI agents, named CAM, EVA, and PHIL, to process medical claims, check patient insurance coverage, and record payments.
Thoughtful AI is far from the only startup using AI to tackle revenue cycle management — it’s jumped in the rings with top-funded players like $6 billion startup Commure, which dug into RCM by merging with Athelas in October, as well as up-and-coming companies like Codametrix, which grabbed a $40 million Series B in March.
But while many startups use AI to help automate key parts of these processes, Thoughtful AI says its agents can do 100% of these workflows autonomously.
Those agents help healthcare clinics cut the costs of hiring new workers and make their existing workers more efficient, Zekoff said, delivering an average of five to six times in savings what customers pay for Thoughtful AI’s solutions.
The startup says it currently has between 30 and 40 customers, some of which have hundreds of clinics across the country.
Thoughtful AI’s original vision is playing out across industries, too. The popularity of AI agents is exploding, with startups grabbing cash for agents that automate business functions like customer support and software development, and Big Tech behemoths like Google funneling cash into their own AI agent projects.
Thoughtful AI has raised $40 million to date, Zekoff said. That includes a $5 million seed round in September 2021, also led by Drive Capital, plus an unannounced $10 million seed extension and $5 million of additional debt funding. The $20 million Series A consists of both equity and debt, he said.
With this fresh funding, Zekoff said he plans to double down on hiring — the startup is looking for engineers in Brazil and Romania, which he says are top sources for Python talent, as well as the US.
He said the startup wants to focus some of the cash on decreasing the time it takes to get a customer’s agents up and running. Right now, Thoughtful AI can deploy its AI agents personalized for its clients’ needs within 90 days; Zekoff said he wants to get that time down to a week.
Zekoff said Thoughtful AI aims to hit $10 million in annual recurring revenue by the end of the summer. The startup expects to raise its Series B in early 2025.
Its goal, Zekoff said, is to get to $100 million in annual recurring revenue in about the next two years, with 100 employees in the US.
