Apriori sells what it claims is the only real-time predictive cost-management enterprise software on the market. The company’s application does not rely on statistical or historical data, unlike its rivals, Azzolino said.
Instead, Apriori’s uses information that exists in mechanical CAD and product lifecycle management, as well as a customer’s supply chain and vendors, and enterprise resource planning systems, he said.
It ties into that ecosystems and it uniquely characterizes the costs associated with a product or a product decision, Azzolino said.
What we offer is visibility into the cost impact of the decisions that are made before production – from design engineering, to sourcing, finance and manufacturing; decisions that are made from concept all the way through release of product.
Apriori’s biggest competitors are disparate Microsoft Excel spreadsheets, he added.
Apriori’s product, released about 14 months ago, is currently geared toward discreet product manufacturers and companies. Most of Apriori’s existing 13 customers are high-tech and industrial machinery, but Azzolino expects to map to other verticals and industries over the long term.
His vision is for enterprise cost management to eventually become a major enterprise software category, much like ERP.
Concord, Massachusetts-based Apriori, which currently employs 38 people, previously raised $4.5m in May 2004, following its launch in ’03. Azzolino said it would expand its sales team to about 10 reps, all in the US. While it has overseas customers, in China, Mexico and Europe, he said no reps would be added in the short term.
The company is not yet profitable, but expects to be so by the end of 2008, Azzolino said. He noted this was by design because it is currently in growth, not profit, mode. He’s hoping to take Apriori public within the next three to five years.
Existing investors Bain Capital and Sigma partners participated in the latest round.
