London-based startup Desia, a system of intelligence offering advanced AI-driven applications for productivity, automation, and analytics in financial services, has raised $3.3 million in a pre-seed funding round. The funding round was led by Dig Ventures and included prominent investors such as 2100 Ventures, Exor Ventures, and Octopus Ventures, alongside several angel investors. This significant capital injection is expected to accelerate Desia’s mission of transforming how investment professionals manage data through automation and artificial intelligence (AI).

Innovative Solution for Financial Services

Desia was co-founded by Raffaele Terrone, Alessandro Amaro, and Mehmet Öner Yalçin. Terrone, who co-founded Scalapay—Italy’s first unicorn—brings a wealth of entrepreneurial experience. Amaro, previously with Advent International, and Yalçin also contribute strong financial backgrounds. Together, they have created Desia to address a pressing issue in the financial services industry: the inefficiency of data processing for investment professionals.

Although many sectors of the financial industry have embraced technological advancements, investment professionals still face the time-consuming task of manually sorting through vast quantities of data, often unstructured and difficult to analyze. Desia’s AI-driven platform aims to change this by automatically extracting and analyzing investment-related data, thus streamlining workflows and significantly improving productivity.

Strategic Investors and Industry Support

The $3.3 million pre-seed funding round attracted a diverse group of investors. Leading the round was Dig Ventures, whose Founding Partner, Ross Mason, praised Desia’s innovative approach. Mason drew parallels between Desia’s work and his own experiences at MuleSoft, citing the platform’s potential to address a key inefficiency in financial data processing. Other participating investors included 2100 Ventures, Vento by Exor Ventures, Octopus Ventures, Foreword Ventures, Plug & Play Ventures, and LaunchBay Capital.

Notable angel investors also contributed to the round, including Niccolo Maisto, Founder of FaceIT; Mark Ransford, Senior Advisor at CVC Capital Partners; and Massimo della Ragione, former Partner at Goldman Sachs. Their involvement underscores Desia’s credibility and the belief that its AI solutions will have a profound impact on the financial services landscape.

Desia’s Impact on Financial Services

Desia’s platform is already being used by investment professionals who see its potential to transform their daily operations. By automating the process of extracting knowledge from vast amounts of unstructured data, Desia provides valuable insights and analysis in a fraction of the time it would take manually. This not only saves time and resources but also empowers professionals to make better-informed decisions.

As Co-Founder and CEO Raffaele Terrone reflected on his own experiences, he remarked on how Desia could have made his work at Goldman Sachs significantly more efficient. “I recall regularly sifting through data and information until the early hours during my time at Goldman Sachs in order to make fully informed decisions and strategies. With Desia, the whole process would have been more efficient and successful. This initial funding round is a major step towards developing the system for more structured and complex investment analyses.”

Co-Founder and Chief Product Officer (CPO) Alessandro Amaro echoed this sentiment, noting that the team is tackling one of the biggest challenges in the financial industry—processing unstructured data. Amaro emphasized that the team's collective experience in the investment industry and in building robust technology products positions them well to solve this problem and deliver significant value to their users.

Future Growth and Global Expansion

With this fresh round of capital, Desia is poised for rapid development and expansion. The company has set its sights on key financial markets, including the UK, the US, and Continental Europe. The aim is to use AI not just to optimize data management but to revolutionize the financial services industry, transforming how professionals handle and process information. By leveraging automation, Desia hopes to reshape workflows, increase productivity, and drive more data-informed decision-making.

Desia’s long-term vision is to fundamentally alter the financial services landscape by providing cutting-edge AI tools that streamline and automate complex processes. This will allow investment professionals to focus on higher-level strategic tasks, freeing them from the burdens of manual data processing.

Desia’s $3.3 million pre-seed funding round, led by Dig Ventures and supported by a host of prominent venture capital firms and angel investors, marks a significant milestone for the company. With its innovative AI-driven platform, Desia is addressing a critical challenge in the financial services industry: the inefficiency of data analysis and management. As Desia continues to develop and expand, its solutions have the potential to transform the industry, making investment professionals more productive, strategic, and informed.