Numica, a New York start-up using artificial intelligence to run small accounting practices, has raised $21 million to buy more firms from retiring owners and expand its operations across the US.
The funding, made up of equity and debt, came from Roosh X, the investment arm of Ukrainian technology group Roosh, and London-based Flashpoint. Slava Orekoff, Numica’s co-founder and chief executive, said most of the money would be used for acquisitions.
Numica buys practices, retains their staff and clients, and transfers much of the work to its software. It launched in June 2025 and has acquired seven firms, serving about 6,000 clients in New York, New Jersey, Florida, Texas and California.
Its customers include restaurants, trucking companies, property businesses and healthcare practices. The company completed its latest acquisition on Monday and expects to close another next week, Orekoff said.
The expansion comes as many small accountancy firms face a shortage of successors. Orekoff estimates that about half of the 87,000 small accounting firms in the US are owned by baby boomer certified public accountants or enrolled agents who will retire within five to seven years.
At the same time, fewer people are entering the profession. US universities awarded 55,152 bachelor’s and master’s degrees in accounting during the 2023-24 academic year, a 6.6 per cent fall from the previous year, according to the American Institute of CPAs.
“If your CPA is retiring, you are left,” Orekoff said. “What they are buying most of the time is peace of mind.”
How Numica’s AI accounting model works
Numica takes over billing, recruitment and technical systems from the first day of an acquisition, while the accountants already dealing with clients remain in place. Former owners can continue working part-time with longstanding customers under transition arrangements lasting up to four years.
Orekoff said most retiring owners chose to stay on in that capacity. “We were thinking that there will be more stress when it comes to transition,” he said. “In fact, clients are more appreciative than anything else.”
The company uses its own AI tools to monitor broker listings and online marketplaces for potential acquisitions. Orekoff said it can learn of a new listing within five minutes, although referrals from accountants who have already sold their practices are now Numica’s biggest source of deals.
Its software codes transactions, prepares profit and loss statements and balance sheets, and handles state, federal, sales and payroll tax filings. Numica says the system covered about 75 per cent of the firms’ workflows in its first year.
Accountants still check the software’s output, manage unusual cases and deal directly with clients. A CPA reviews and signs off the final work.
Numica said margins at its first practice, in New York, increased from 37 per cent to 52 per cent within two months, with a projected rise to 70 per cent.
Clients are informed when their accounting firm is sold, and in states where consent is required, letters are sent to them. Orekoff said consent letters for the latest transaction were issued two hours after the deal closed.
However, clients are not generally told how extensively AI is being used. Orekoff compared the technology with familiar accounting tools, asking: “Do you care if a calculator or Excel was used to make calculations?”
He acknowledged that some customers could leave because of concerns about unfamiliar technology. Some are already using AI themselves, arriving with tax suggestions generated by ChatGPT that accountants then have to explain may not apply to their circumstances.
“A lot of AIs are now programmed in a way that they want to please you,” Orekoff said. “Because of that, it will not disagree with you.”
Orekoff began writing accounting software at 17 and spent about seven years working on it before joining SAP. He later founded Numica with Victor Lysenko.
“I’ve never heard of someone dreaming to become a person moving numbers from one spreadsheet to another,” Orekoff said. “The future of the industry is to be more client facing, spend more time with the client.”
