Spenmo founder said to launch AI finance hotel startup Veridian
- ByStartupStory | October 30, 2025
Mohandass Kalaichelvan, the founder of Spenmo, a leading Southeast Asian fintech payments software company, is embarking on a new venture—launching an AI-powered finance startup for the hotel industry called Veridian. This marks a fresh chapter for Kalaichelvan following his success in transforming corporate payments and expense management with Spenmo.
Veridian is designed to revolutionize finance operations within the hospitality sector by deploying autonomous AI agents that automate traditionally manual, error-prone processes. Hospitality finance teams often grapple with tedious reconciliations, delayed payments, complex billing for corporate and MICE (Meetings, Incentives, Conferences, and Exhibitions) customers, and manual handling of virtual credit card (VCC) charges. Veridian’s AI-driven platform aims to completely eliminate these pain points, allowing hotel finance teams to shift focus from administrative tasks to strategic decision-making.
The platform’s core capabilities include intelligent accounts receivable reconciliation, automated and accurate corporate billing, and seamless auto-charging of VCCs, ensuring timely and accurate payment processing. By leveraging advanced agentic AI, Veridian can dynamically process transactions, detect and recover revenue leakages, and integrate smoothly with a hotel’s financial systems.
Kalaichelvan is understood to have raised or borrowed at least $2 million in initial funding for Veridian, signaling strong confidence in the startup’s potential. The company is already operating with a vision of a future where finance operations in hotels are smarter, faster, and more profitable.
Kalaichelvan’s journey began with Spenmo, which he co-founded in 2019. Spenmo became a market-leading payments platform that consolidated spend management, corporate cards, automated bill payments, approval workflows, and accounting reconciliation into a single integrated software suite. The company rapidly grew with support from top-tier investors such as Y Combinator, Tiger Global, Insight Partners, Addition, Salesforce Ventures, and others, securing over $120 million in venture capital.
Recognizing that expense management was only a fragment of companies’ payables challenges, Kalaichelvan refocused Spenmo towards becoming a payments platform centralizing vendor payments, payroll, and multi-currency bank account reconciliations. This broad approach solved silos faced by finance teams and positioned the company as a crucial infrastructure player at the heart of corporate payouts.
With Veridian, Kalaichelvan is taking a similar transformative approach but tailored to the hotel industry’s unique needs. The hospitality sector has complex financial workflows due to the mix of room bookings, event coordination, corporate client billing, and diverse revenue streams. Veridian’s AI agents can autonomously manage these workflows, reduce manual errors, accelerate cash flows, and minimize revenue leakage—all critical factors for hotel profitability and operational efficiency.
Veridian’s leadership team also includes key technology and industry experts, blending Kalaichelvan’s fintech expertise with deep knowledge of hospitality finance and artificial intelligence. The startup’s headquarters are in the United States, indicating plans for global market ambitions.
As automation and AI continue to disrupt traditional industries, Veridian represents a promising example of how specialized fintech solutions can unlock new efficiency frontiers. Kalaichelvan’s proven track record with Spenmo and Spenmo’s valuation growth provide a strong foundation for the new venture’s success.
The launch of Veridian is expected to attract further investment interest as the hotel industry increasingly seeks digital tools to improve operational resilience and customer experiences in a post-pandemic world.
In summary, Mohandass Kalaichelvan’s new startup Veridian is poised to transform hotel finance operations by fully automating manual processes using intelligent AI agents. Backed by initial funding and leadership experience, Veridian aims to become the leading AI finance platform for hospitality, driving smarter and faster financial workflows that boost profitability and growth.
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