Arkero, a Seattle-area startup focused on using AI to help manage the day-to-day operations of sports organizations, raised $6 million in pre-seed funding.
Founded by Shivaas Gulati, co-founder of Remitly, and two other veterans of the Seattle digital remittance company, Arkero launched last fall. The startup has secured early partnerships across three pro soccer leagues, including with the Seattle Sounders FC, Seattle Reign FC, San Diego FC and Bolton Wanderers FC.
Arkero’s AI works with existing systems and tools including data warehouses, Slack, email, ticketing, and more. It learns from past procedures to inform new decisions around programs, activations, partnerships, and fan-engagement strategies and help teams make more money with faster, data-driven decisions.
Initial deployments of Arkero’s platform are focused on integrating AI into matchday planning and season-ticket renewals.
“I own a football club. I’ve sat in the meetings, lived the chaos, and felt the cost of running a business on Excel and email. The opportunity exists because this is broken from the inside,” said Gulati, Arkero’s CEO, who is part of the ownership group of Southend United, which plays in the fifth tier of English football.
Gulati has also served as a technical advisor to the Sounders, helping the Major League Soccer club with its AI and tech strategy.
Sounders majority owner Adrian Hanauer is among Arkero’s investors. The funding round was led by Roger Ehrenberg of Game Changers Ventures, with participation from Alexis Ohanian (776), David Tisch (BoxGroup), Garuda Ventures, Founders’ Co-op, and others.
“On and off the pitch, our business is about constantly looking ahead to identify what we can do better and how we can use technology and the right partners to gain a competitive edge,” Hanauer said in a statement. “Our investment in Arkero is aligned with this approach, accounting for not just where we are as an organization today, but where we need to be going forward.”
Arkero said the Sounders and Reign project over 50% improvement in “efficiency savings” around matchday planning in 2026, driven by AI’s ability to reduce manual work and make faster decisions and fewer operational errors.
Gulati helped co-found Remitly in 2011, the company went public in 2021 and he left in 2022. He spent years at the company alongside his Arkero co-founders — Vamsi Narla, who leads product and engineering, and Daniel Shi, who oversees business operations.
Last year, Gulati told GeekWire that Seattle is “a great place to build a company, and we’re going to double down on that and build another big company here.”
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