Pie, a startup founded by two former Toast engineers, has raised $19.5 million to address a growing blind spot for small businesses: appearing in AI-generated search results. The company has spent the past year building quietly, betting that the shift from traditional Google search to AI-driven discovery tools creates a new category of need.
The funding round, led by undisclosed investors, positions Pie to tackle what it sees as an emerging market. The founders argue that small businesses once needed help showing up on Google, and now face a similar challenge with AI search platforms like ChatGPT and Perplexity.
Competitors are few, but the opportunity is large: millions of small businesses have little to no presence in AI-generated answers. Pie aims to offer a solution that helps these companies get listed and recommended by AI tools, similar to how SEO services boosted Google rankings.
For the small business ecosystem, this signals a shift in digital marketing priorities. As AI search gains traction, the tools that underpin local discovery are evolving. Pie's early move suggests that the next battleground for small business visibility may be AI, not just search engines.
The founders, whose backgrounds include building point-of-sale and payment systems at Toast, bring operational experience from a company that scaled to serve hundreds of thousands of restaurants. Their pivot to AI search reflects a broader trend of fintech talent entering adjacent markets.