GovSignals announced that it had raised a $5.5 million seed round led by Unusual VC and launched the first AI platform to automate finding and bidding on government contracts.
Generally, it has been difficult for private-sector companies to earn government contracts and grants. This process is time-consuming and complex, requiring large research teams and weeks or months of work to create proposals. Thus, only large companies typically pursue and win these contracts. Plus, political connections tend to supersede great ideas, and many companies don’t even engage because the process is so complex and slow.
GovSignals removes much of the time and complexity of government contracting with its AI engine that constantly scans for new opportunities, flags relevant projects for users, and helps companies create compliant proposals with just a few clicks. In the first two weeks of using the platform, a GovSignals customer recently more than doubled the number of proposals submitted and found additional opportunities to apply for, with no extra staff. GovSignals can do in a few minutes what would take a research team months to do, and GovSignals proposals are fully compliant (meaning they cover every requirement that the RFP specified).
GovSignals doubled its customer base each quarter in 2024 and works with companies of all sizes. And GovSignals recently signed on with a global top 3 consulting firm looking to improve efficiency for its govcon processes. Launched in 2023, the founders self-funded the first year with capital from their past successful exits. This new funding round will help GovSignals invest in hiring and product development as it takes advantage of this unique moment.
Other vendors in this space have pinpoint solutions (for instance, just grants or just federal government opportunities) and mostly offer simple LLM wrappers that generate rough copy without writing to the government’s requirements and an understanding of industry nuances across the vertical. GovSignals handles everything from pre-RFP through submitting compliant proposals for federal, state, local, and education (SLED) government opportunities. And only GovSignals has Intelligence capabilities to surface potential opportunities pre-RFP and then connect them to a compliant proposal process.
GovSignals was created by four serial entrepreneurs with deep experience in government contracting, procurement and advanced AI:
1.) Derek Hoyt, GovSignals co-founder and CEO, spent nine years as a DIA Intelligence Officer before joining Palantir, where he led the SEC contract and rollout of advanced AI tech to the U.S. Marine Corps. He also managed Ultra’s R&D engineering development proposals for Lockheed, Boeing, and Raytheon.
2.) Ethan Aldrich, co-founder and Chief Product Officer (CPO), has worked in government tech for eight years and studied AI at Stanford. He has delivered software to more than 100 counties and states, including prisons, police, and local governments.
3.) Jeremy Doochin, co-founder and Chief Revenue Officer (CRO), has founded and built several successful tech companies. He also served as a Special Advisor to the U.S. Department of Energy, overseeing $34 billion in contracts. He also served as a National Director of the Sierra Club and received an MBA from Harvard Business School.
4.) Conner Aldrich, co-founder and CTO, has deep experience building and training LLMs and complex enterprise-scale AI solutions. His work spans high-performance computing, real-time inference systems, and fault-tolerant architectures.
KEY QUOTES:
“The current government contracting process is broken, and the next administration will likely be making major changes in government spending. It’s perfect timing for a new tech platform that leverages AI to accelerate the govcon process and ensure that the most innovative ideas and technology make their way to the government. GovSignals has the best technology and the right team to make this work.”
- Lars Albright, General Partner at Unusual Ventures
“There are two things we consistently hear from customers – the first is that they love our ability to automatically create proposals that are tailored to a company’s core capabilities. The second is our ability to surface intelligence about potential procurement opportunities before the government even knows. Our aim is to ensure that the government finds the best ideas and technologies so the US can mitigate its current national security risk of slow and mismatched acquisition processes.”
- Derek Hoyt
