Fondo

Fondo (legal entity BloomJoy, Inc.) is a San Francisco-based accounting platform for startups, combining software with in-house CPAs and accountants who take over a company's bookkeeping, corporate tax filings and R&D tax credit claims. Its bookkeeping service categorizes transactions, reconciles accounts and closes the books on a monthly, quarterly or annual cadence, delivering a reporting package that includes a runway report, profit-and-loss statement, balance sheet and statement of cash flows, plus a finance dashboard and access to a dedicated accountant (via Slack on the monthly plan). Onboarding connects a customer's bank, payroll and accounting tools, and the company states most founders complete setup in under 15 minutes.

The tax side is sold as "TaxPass," covering federal corporate tax filing (Form 1120), state filings, Delaware franchise tax and foreign shareholder filings, with add-ons for additional states, foreign subsidiary and foreign bank account forms, and an R&D tax credit study (Form 6765). Fondo tells founders startups can be eligible for up to $500,000 per year in cash-back tax credits, and reports that the average startup recovers about $21,000 per year. A free "TaxPlan" product summarizes where, when and how much a startup owes in corporate taxes, including Section 174 adjustments and estimated R&D credits.

The company positions itself specifically around Delaware C-Corps from pre-seed to Series B, and says it has helped thousands of startups save more than $100 million in aggregate, including companies that later exited to public acquirers such as HubSpot, Meta and X.

Founding story

Fondo grew out of the founders' prior Y Combinator startup, which nearly missed payroll after losing visibility into its cash position and found existing tools could not answer basic questions about burn or runway. Rather than shut down, the team pivoted. The first version of Fondo had no software at all — a landing page, spreadsheets and manual bookkeeping — an intentionally unscalable start that shaped the product. Founder and CEO David J. Phillips began his career as an accountant at Deloitte, learned to code, and previously co-founded Hackbright Academy, a coding school acquired by Capella Education (NASDAQ: CPLA).

Business model

Subscription and fee-based services delivered by an internal accounting team plus software, sold directly to startups with no long contracts and cancel-anytime terms. Offerings are packaged as recurring bookkeeping plans, an annual corporate tax subscription (TaxPass), per-item tax add-ons, and R&D tax credit studies; a self-serve option and a sales-assisted demo path both exist.

Recurring subscriptions plus add-on fees. Published pricing: TaxPass from $1,950/year (promotional $1,450/year); tax add-ons from $500 each; bookkeeping from $499/month (promotional $399/month) for monthly close, from $1,198/quarter for quarterly, or from $950/year for annual; catch-up bookkeeping from $950. The company reported over $6 million in ARR and profitability as of its November 2024 seed announcement.

Traction

More than 500 startups used Fondo as of February 2023, over 1,200 as of November 2024, and the company's site and YC profile cite 2,000+ startups. Reported metrics include roughly $3 million ARR in 2022 (nearly tripling year over year) growing to over $6 million ARR with profitability by November 2024, average annual growth above 250% since launch, more than $3.5 million in IRS cash back secured for customers in Q4 2022, over $100 million saved for customers cumulatively, and a team that grew from 54 people in 2022 to 70+ and a listed team size of 80.

Latest developments

In November 2024 Fondo closed a $7 million oversubscribed seed round led by Money Forward, comprising $4.6 million of equity and a $2.4 million Capchase debt facility, at a stated $66 million valuation, with proceeds directed to product development, platform automation and hiring across product, engineering, accounting and go-to-market. At the time it disclosed over $6 million in ARR, profitability and 1,200+ startup customers. The company has since launched TaxPlan, a free corporate tax and R&D credit estimate, and its site and YC listing now cite 2,000+ startup customers and an 80-person team.