A startup that replaces the sales department: how MoonAI reached a $5 million valuation

Read the story of the team building AI agents that actually work.

Askat Adhamov, City — Almaty, Founder of MoonAI

How It All Began

I am a serial founder. MoonAI is my second venture project. Previously, I developed an EdTech startup, worked in the tourism and consulting sectors, and advised over 150 businesses on creating sales departments, systematization, and scaling. At the intersection of this experience and the challenges faced by small and medium-sized businesses, the MoonAI solution was born.

We help companies without technical skills deeply integrate AI solutions into their business processes. The problem we solve is that clients often do not receive fast and high-quality responses—leading to lost leads and customers. The second problem is the high level of routine for sales managers and customer-facing employees, which leads to burnout and high staff turnover. Artificial intelligence is capable of solving these tasks, but in practice, more than 82% of companies attempting to implement AI solutions on their own fail—the technology causes more harm than good: context is lost, and customers are lost.

Our AI solution is deeply integrated into business processes, connects with any CRM and ERP systems, ensuring high accuracy of responses and helping businesses automate processes by replacing part of human labor.

The company was founded when I organized a tour with a well-known entrepreneur in the CIS region to London. We received over 10,000 applications and needed to process them quickly. At that moment, GPT-3.5 was released, and the idea arose to apply AI. Chatbots were not suitable, and manual sales were inefficient—the check was around £15,000. We implemented an AI solution, and it worked.

Later, friends from a business club asked us to implement similar solutions for them. Thus, our first clients appeared, and the product developed through real-world tasks.

The Team

Initially, I started alone to bootstrap and test the idea. Later, I brought on the first developers and invested my own funds, as well as money from the first clients, into the platform's development. Currently, the team consists of 19 people, including 6 engineers with extensive experience in ML and AI.

The company's headquarters is registered in Delaware, with subsidiaries in Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan.

Target Audience

Our target audience consists of owners and top managers of small and medium-sized companies that already have systematic processes in place and dedicated departments interacting with clients. In such businesses, AI integrates well and enhances existing processes. If there is no system in place, AI is ineffective—it has nothing to rely on, lacks context, and structure. Currently, we have over 170 clients.

Incubation Programs

We have gone through several acceleration programs, each of which helped us develop and scale the business.

The first was SelectUSA, held in Washington. We were the only startup from Kazakhstan participating in the program. There, we found our first potential clients and investors, and also participated in startup battles in San Francisco, Palo Alto, and at the annual Berkshire Hathaway meeting, where we met our first potential clients and investors from the US.

Next came the MOST Acceleration Program, where we received not only mentoring advice but also investments totaling $200,000.

Later, we joined the DSA Acceleration Program by IT Park Uzbekistan. As part of the program, we were provided with $50,000 via SAFE, accommodation, and support for entering the Uzbek market. Additionally, we participated in Clash of Startups in Tashkent, where we took first place and received $25,000 from IT Park Uzbekistan.

We were also selected for Alchemist Accelerator and Hero’s Training by Draper University, but decided not to go in order to focus on growth in Kazakhstan.

Currently, we are participating in the DSA program by IT Park, where we can receive $50,000 via SAFE, and in the second program, Quick Startup by Nazarbayev University. We have also been selected for the Go Broad program, organized by the Sustainable Innovation and Technology Foundation, where we were invited to an intensive program in Silicon Valley and to participate in TechCrunch Disrupt.

Furthermore, we became winners of the Astana Hub Battle and received the Ticket to the Future nomination from Magzhan Madiyev, under which Astana Hub Ventures invests $25,000 via SAFE in us.

Achievements

We plan to bring our current growth to the target break-even point and, with this result, enter the American market.

As of today, MRR is growing by an average of 35% monthly, and the company aims to maintain this pace. This summer, our valuation was $4 million; currently, we are raising a bridge round at a $5 million SAFE valuation, which will allow us to prepare for large-scale growth.

Our key difference from competitors is deep integration into business processes and high accuracy of AI agents. Simple chatbots can be built in a day, but their accuracy usually does not exceed 85-90%. This means that 10 out of 100 clients receive incorrect information.

Our accuracy reaches 98%, which directly impacts the business: it increases conversion, reduces personnel costs, and increases profit.

Challenges

Among the difficulties, the most challenging stage was at the beginning, when we tried to bootstrap without investments, putting in our own funds, taking loans, and selling assets to keep the startup alive. It has become easier now, but it has become harder to say "no." For example, declining participation in Alchemist in San Francisco or a long trip to the US, despite the prospects. It is important to focus on strategically significant areas.

Plans

Our current focus is to build two automated customer acquisition funnels and launch a full-fledged partnership model. Currently, we have partners, but mostly they bring clients without further support. We want to provide them with tools and dashboards so they can independently find clients, implement solutions, and support them.

We are creating a new profession—AI agent integrators. These are specialists who, without programming skills, can create and implement solutions for business. This is not about displacing jobs, but about creating new, more intelligent professions.

The second direction is entering the US market. We already work with clients in the CIS, but to achieve ambitious goals, we need to scale. The American market is more complex and competitive, but it is there that technologies are born. Therefore, our goal is to establish ourselves in Central Asia, reach key performance indicators, and then enter the US. In the long term, we are also considering the MENA and Latin American markets, but the United States remains the top priority.