Opal, a software platform designed to make life easier for ad agencies by automating their financial operations, has raised $1.5M in pre-seed funding. The round was led by Founders Co-op, with support from Exit North Ventures. This funding will help launch Opal Spend, a tool that seamlessly integrates ad spending with accounting, invoicing, and contract management.
At the end of this article, we have included an exclusive email interview with Alex Steele, where he shares the inspiration behind Opal Spend, the ideal customer base, and what’s next for the company.
Opal was founded in 2024 by Alex Steele, a former agency owner who personally experienced the financialheadaches agencies face. Running a media-buying business meant dealing with multiple disconnected tools for invoicing, payments, and contract management—leading to wasted time and delayed cash flow. Steele built Opal to eliminate those inefficiencies by bringing everything into one streamlined system.
Since its launch, Opal has grown 400%, attracting top-tier engineering talent, including former Twitter (X) engineers. Steele’s goal is simple: free up agencies from tedious financial admin so they can focus on creativity and growth.
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Opal’s latest feature, Opal Spend, is designed to revolutionize ad-spend management. Agencies traditionally have to choose between earning cashback on their ad spend and taking on financial risk. Opal Spend removes that tradeoff by linking ad spend directly to client accounts. This way, agencies can earn cashback without financial exposure.
Opal Spend automates invoicing and accounting, eliminating the need for manual reconciliation. The system ensures that funds come directly from client accounts, reducing agency liability and making financial management smoother. It also auto-updates virtual cards across major ad platforms such as Meta, Google, Apple, and Amazon, preventing disruptions and keeping campaigns running seamlessly. With clearer financial oversight, agencies and larger advertisers gain a complete view of budgets and performance, helping them optimize their ad strategies effectively.
“Opal is building the Shopify for agencies. Just like Shopify provides the back-end of an ecommerce business, Opal provides the operating system for agencies. Having led an agency for years, we constantly juggled multiple back-office tools that don’t talk to each other, so half of our back-office work was copying the same data over and over into different horizontal tools,” said Alex Steele, founder and CEO of Opal.
“We built Opal to be a modern financial backbone for agencies—one that reduces friction from contract creation all the way through invoicing and payment. With the launch of Opal Spend, we are putting everything—contracts, invoicing, payments, attribution—under one umbrella, reducing friction, speeding up revenue, and delivering a clearer picture of performance. All an agency should worry about is getting customers and serving them well. Opal makes that a reality,” he continued.
The global digital ad market is expected to hit $870.85 billion by 2027, yet many agencies still rely on outdated financial processes that slow them down. Opal is changing that by automating financial workflows to eliminate repetitive tasks.
Instead of wasting time on administrative burdens, agencies can now focus on scaling their businesses. By linking ad spend directly to client accounts, Opal provides a way for agencies to earn cashback without the risk associated with traditional credit-based ad spend models. Centralizing all back-office operations into one easy-to-use platform streamlines operations and reduces inefficiencies that cost agencies valuable time and money.
“I’ve seen Alex’s passion and technical expertise firsthand, and Opal is a game-changer for agencies,” said Ian Crosby, head of Accounting Products at Mercury said in a media release. “It’s not just about making finances easier—it’s redefining how agencies manage their money.”
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With this funding, Opal is focused on expanding its product features and integrations to offer an even more seamless experience. The company also plans to hire across engineering, product, and customer success teams, ensuring that the platform continues to evolve to meet the needs of agencies. Opal’s ultimate goal is to become the go-to financial platform for media and creative agencies, providing them with the tools they need to succeed without financial friction.
Email interview:
The American Bazaar: What inspired the idea behind Opal Spend?
Alex Steele: Opal Spend is the industry’s first purpose built ad-spend solution. It was built to solve a common headache for agencies, managing ad spend without having to choose between earning cashback and taking on financial risk. It ties ad spend and invoicing together in one system, so agencies don’t have to juggle multiple tools. Instead of extending credit, Opal Spend pulls funds directly from client accounts, letting agencies earn cashback without financial exposure. It also auto-updates virtual card details across major ad platforms like Meta, Google, Apple, and Amazon, cutting out manual work and making sure campaigns keep running smoothly.
Who are Opal’s current clients and who would make Opal’s ideal customer base?
Opal was curated for media and creative agencies to help them streamline back-office operations including contract management, invoicing, and payments. The platform replaces the existing fragmented tools with an all-in-one system that automates financial workflow. Opal Spend, however, is designed for agencies and larger advertisers managing significant ad spend. Agencies benefit from automated invoicing and cashback, while bigger advertisers use Opal to centralize budgets and improve financial oversight.
What’s next for Opal in terms of products as well as financing?
With this new funding, Opal is focused on expanding its current capabilities, strengthening platform integrations, and hiring additional staff spanning engineering, product, and customer success teams. Opal’s long-term vision is to become the premier financial partner for media and creative agencies alike, tying together spend management, invoicing, and data-driven optimization in a singular, frictionless system.