Minerva

What do they actually do

Minerva offers an AI‑first accounting service for small businesses and accounting firms. Customers connect bank accounts, payment platforms (e.g., Stripe, Shopify), documents, email, and chats so Minerva’s agents can ingest transactions and evidence, auto‑classify and reconcile, and draft follow‑ups to collect missing receipts or fix issues. Human accountants at Minerva review outputs, handle edge cases, and approve the final books, producing audit‑ready and tax‑ready reports plus near‑real‑time P&L and cash‑flow views (YC profile/launch post, tryminerva.ai).

The product is delivered as a service with automation plus human oversight rather than a fully autonomous tool today. The go‑to‑market appears to be a demo/invite flow (book a demo/contact) rather than public self‑serve, and the team is small (YC lists ~5 people), consistent with an early commercial stage focused on direct sales and high‑touch onboarding (YC profile/launch post, tryminerva.ai).

Who are their target customer(s)

• Solo or small‑team service business owners (freelancers, consultants, agencies): They spend hours each month categorizing transactions, chasing receipts, and answering basic finance questions instead of billable work. They want bookkeeping and evidence capture handled without manual effort (YC/tryminerva.ai).
• Small e‑commerce sellers (Shopify/Stripe merchants, marketplaces): They struggle to reconcile payouts, fees, refunds, and multi‑channel sales and often miss sales‑tax or cost adjustments. They need integrations that centralize and correctly classify these flows automatically (YC/tryminerva.ai).
• Small accounting or bookkeeping firms scaling client volume: Month‑end close and routine bookkeeping are low‑margin and error‑prone, capping client throughput. They want automation with human control to increase capacity without losing oversight (YC/tryminerva.ai).
• Finance lead at an early‑stage company (head of finance/part‑time CFO): They need timely P&L, reliable cash forecasts, and quick answers like burn rate, but current processes are slow and fragmented. They want near‑real‑time reports and forecasting to speed decisions (YC/tryminerva.ai).
• Growing SMBs with complex cash and tax needs (multi‑jurisdiction or seasonal): They face cash timing issues, missed tax opportunities, and heavy compliance evidence work at month‑end and audits. They need automated reconciliation, evidence capture, and tax‑ready reporting to cut risk and crunch time (YC/tryminerva.ai).

How would they acquire their first 10, 50, and 100 customers

• First 10: Founder‑led pilots via YC/personal networks targeting freelancers, small agencies, and Shopify/Stripe sellers, with free high‑touch onboarding to prove the workflow and gather before/after proof to convert into paid deals (YC/tryminerva.ai).
• First 50: Hire an ops/accounting lead to run onboarding and QA while founders keep closing; run targeted outreach and demos for small bookkeeping firms and e‑commerce SMBs, use short paid pilots/discounts, and publish early case studies; begin co‑selling/referral motions with platform partners (YC/tryminerva.ai).
• First 100: Introduce an invite‑based self‑serve funnel with templated integrations and standardized onboarding; launch an accountant partner program (revenue share/lead credits) to turn firms into a channel, and reinvest referral traction into paid acquisition and product polish (YC/tryminerva.ai).

What is the rough total addressable market

Top-down context:

Global bookkeeping services are estimated around $34–35B in 2024, indicating a large spend pool for outsourced bookkeeping and close services; the U.S. has tens of millions of small businesses that drive demand (EconMarketResearch, SBA 2024 FAQ).

Bottom-up calculation:

Assume 2.0M U.S. SMBs are target buyers for outsourced/AI‑assisted bookkeeping, paying roughly $300–$700/month (QuickBooks Live tiers), with a conservative $400/month average. That implies ~$9.6B annual TAM in the U.S. alone (2.0M × $4,800/year) (QuickBooks Live pricing, QuickBooks Live pricing tiers).

Assumptions:

• Count only U.S. SMBs likely to outsource bookkeeping or use full‑service AI‑assisted bookkeeping (~2.0M out of ~34.8M total SMBs).
• Average monthly spend anchored to QuickBooks Live full‑service tiers ($300/$500/$700), using $400/month midpoint as a conservative proxy.
• Scope limited to bookkeeping/month‑end close; excludes incremental advisory, payroll, payments, and tax filing upsells.

Who are some of their notable competitors

• Pilot: Outsourced bookkeeping, tax, and CFO‑style services for startups and SMBs. Competes directly on end‑to‑end service delivery rather than selling tooling only.
• Botkeeper: Automation platform for accounting firms combining machine automation with human review. Overlaps with Minerva’s automation+human model but focuses on selling to firms.
• Bench: Bookkeeping service for small businesses with a dedicated human team and proprietary software, competing for owners who want to outsource monthly books and taxes.
• Zeni: AI‑first bookkeeping/accounting with a dedicated finance team for startups. Similar promise of automation plus human support for finance leads at early companies.
• QuickBooks Live: Intuit’s bookkeeping service paired with QuickBooks Online and live bookkeepers, competing at the lower‑touch SMB segment with transparent monthly pricing tiers.