Qualcomm backs SpotDraft to scale on-device contract AI with valuation doubling towards $400M

As demand grows for privacy-first enterprise AI that may run with out sending delicate information to the cloud, SpotDraft has raised $8 million from Qualcomm Ventures in a strategic Collection B extension to scale its on-device contract overview tech for regulated authorized workflows.

The extension values SpotDraft at round $380 million, the startup instructed TechCrunch, almost double its $190 million post-money valuation following its $56 million Collection B in February of final yr.

Throughout regulated sectors, enterprises have moved rapidly to check generative AI, however privateness, safety, and information governance issues proceed to gradual adoption for delicate workflows — particularly in authorized, the place contracts can embrace privileged info, mental property, pricing, and deal phrases. Business analysis has constantly flagged information safety and privateness as key boundaries to wider GenAI deployment in skilled providers, pushing distributors like SpotDraft to pursue architectures that maintain core contract intelligence on the consumer’s machine fairly than routing it by way of the cloud.

At Qualcomm’s Snapdragon Summit 2025, SpotDraft demonstrated its VerifAI workflow working end-to-end on Snapdragon X Elite-powered laptops, executing contract overview and edits offline whereas holding the doc on the native machine. SpotDraft stated web connectivity remains to be required for login, licensing, and collaboration options, however contract overview, threat scoring, and redlining can run totally offline with out sending paperwork to the cloud.

SpotDraft sees authorized as an early proving floor for on-device enterprise AI, arguing that delicate contracts usually can’t be routed by way of exterior cloud fashions as a consequence of privateness, safety, and compliance constraints.

“The way forward for how enterprise AI goes to be — proper now, there’s acquired to be AI that’s near the doc, which is privateness crucial, latency delicate, [and] legally delicate, and people are the issues that may transfer on machine,” stated Shashank Bijapur (pictured above, left), co-founder and CEO of SpotDraft, in an interview.

SpotDraft says VerifAI’s on-device functionality extends past merely producing summaries, with the instrument designed to use playbooks and proposals immediately inside Microsoft Phrase, the way in which authorized groups already work. “VerifAI will examine a contract in opposition to your pointers, your playbooks, your prior insurance policies,” stated Madhav Bhagat (pictured above, proper), co-founder and CTO of SpotDraft.

Bijapur instructed TechCrunch that the demand for on-device AI is rising most clearly in tightly regulated sectors, together with protection and pharma, the place inner safety critiques and information residency necessities can gradual or block using cloud-based AI instruments for delicate paperwork.

On-device fashions have quickly closed the hole with cloud-based methods, each in output high quality and response instances, Bhagat stated. “Now we’ve come to a spot the place, by way of eval, we’re seeing as little as 5% distinction between the frontier fashions, and a few of these fine-tuned on machine fashions,” he stated, including that speeds on newer chips at the moment are “one-third of what we get within the cloud.”

Since its launch in 2017, SpotDraft stated it has reached greater than 700 clients, up from round 400 in February final yr, and counts Apollo.io, Panasonic, Zeplin, and Whatfix amongst its customers. The corporate stated adoption is rising on its contract lifecycle administration platform, with clients now processing over 1 million contracts yearly, contract volumes rising 173% year-over-year, and almost 50,000 month-to-month energetic customers. It additionally expects 100% year-over-year income development in 2026, after rising 169% in 2024 and posting the same development charge in 2025, although it didn’t share particular income figures.

SpotDraft plans to make use of the brand new capital to deepen its product and AI capabilities and increase its enterprise presence throughout the Americas, the EMEA area (Europe, Center East, and Africa), and India, Bijapur stated, including that Qualcomm’s involvement extends past financing into joint improvement and go-to-market efforts for on-device deployments. The startup’s on-device workflow is presently obtainable to a restricted set of shoppers, and the founders anticipate it to increase extra broadly as suitable AI PC {hardware} turns into extra extensively obtainable.

“SpotDraft’s capacity to deploy their proprietary fashions securely on-device utilizing Snapdragon platforms represents a significant development for a privacy-critical trade,” stated Quinn Li, senior vice chairman, Qualcomm Applied sciences, and international head of Qualcomm Ventures.

Bengaluru- and New York-based SpotDraft stated it has a group of 300-plus workers, together with 15–20 within the U.S., the place COO Akshay Verma is predicated, and 4 to 5 within the UK, with the remainder of the workforce in Bengaluru.

Thus far, the startup has raised $92 million, together with the newest Qualcomm Ventures funding. Its earlier traders embrace Vertex Progress Singapore, Trident Progress Companions, Xeed VC, Arkam Ventures, and Prosus Ventures.