Runway clarity without a finance hire.
You have a bookkeeper, a spreadsheet, and a founder who does collections at 11pm. Stratum gives you a finance function that runs itself and a runway number you can trust every morning — before the first finance hire.
- 1Collections AgentLiveReceivables chased, escalated, and collected.
- 2Cash AgentIn developmentCash position and runway, forecast daily.
- 3Close AgentEarly accessReconciliations and month-end, closed on schedule.
Where the month goes wrong.
What we hear most often from seed to series b, before an agent is on the ledger.
Founders do collections
The person who should be selling is chasing last quarter's invoices, because nobody else knows which customers need a call.
Runway is a guess
The board asks for months of runway. The answer comes from a spreadsheet last opened before the bridge round.
The books close late
Investor updates go out with 'numbers to follow' because the bookkeeper is still matching Stripe payouts.
What the first thirty days look like.
Connect on day one. By day thirty, the agents are doing the daily work and you are approving what matters. This is the shape of it.
- Day 1
Connect and set thresholds
QuickBooks connected, bank feeds read-only, an approval threshold set at $5,000. The Collections Agent reads your open invoices and proposes a sequence per customer. You approve the tone.
- Week 1
The reminders go out
Every open invoice is on a cadence. Two customers reply that they need more time; the agent drafts payment plans and holds them for you. One tap each.
- Week 2
The Cash Agent starts talking
The morning note now includes runway. It has noticed that your biggest customer pays on day 12, not day 30, and adjusted the forecast accordingly.
- Week 3
The close is already half done
The Close Agent has matched every bank transaction as it landed and drafted the deferred revenue entries. Your bookkeeper reviews instead of reconstructs.
- Day 30
The investor update writes itself
The period locks on the 4th. DSO is down, cash is reconciled, and the numbers in the update are the numbers in the ledger.
What we would agree to measure.
Every engagement starts with an outcome written down. These are the numbers we typically put on the table for this segment. They are targets, not promises.
< 1 hr/week
Founder hours on finance
Approvals and the morning brief.
Daily
Runway visibility
13-week forecast from the actual ledger.
≤ 5 days
Close time target
So investor updates carry real numbers.
3 agents, one judgment layer.
Each agent owns one job. They share what they learn about your customers, vendors and cadence, so the second agent is smarter on day one than the first was.
Common questions from startups.
If yours is not here, ask on the call. We answer plainly.
Startups
Talk to us about startups.
Thirty minutes with the founder. Bring your receivables, payables or close as they are today; we will tell you where an agent earns its keep first.