A California-based legal tech startup originally founded in New Zealand has raised A$81 million (US$55m) in a Series B.
The round for Ivo was led by Blackbird, with support from Costanoa Ventures, Uncork Capital, Fika Ventures, and Kiwi VCs GD1, and Icehouse Ventures, and values the business at $530 million.
The Series B comes 12 months after a $24 million (US$16m) Series A led by US VC Costanoa Ventures, and a $7.2m (US$4.8m) Seed round led by Fika Ventures and Uncork Capital in April 2024.
Ivo set out to use artificial intelligence to reduce the time, effort and cost spent on negotiating contracts. Its AI Contract Review platform, designed to help legal and business teams accelerate time-to-close and unblock contracts from key business processes, and is used by Uber, Shopify, IBM, Reddit and Canva.
The business is now based in San Francisco, having moved there in 2023 after being founded in New Zealand in 2021 by a former corporate lawyer and ex-Xero engineer.
The company takes its name from the 13th Century French priest and judge, Ivo of Kermantin, the patron saint of lawyers, judges and abandoned children.
The funding will be used to triple the startup’s headcount to 60 by the end of the year.
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