Forgepoint lands $9.8M to deploy AI sales agents across manufacturing RFQ workflows
The startup has built Frank, an autonomous agent that handles customer quote requests for manufacturers, cutting response times and freeing up skilled workers from administrative overhead.
Forgepoint Inc. has secured $9.8 million in seed funding to expand deployment of its artificial intelligence sales agent across the manufacturing sector. Primary Venture Partners and a16z Speedrun, the accelerator operated by Andreessen Horowitz, co-led the round, with participation from angel investors tied to OpenAI Group PBC, Brex LLC, Vercel Inc. and Social Finance LLC.
The company has developed Frank, an AI agent designed to function as an inside sales representative by automating the request for quotation (RFQ) process. Frank integrates with a manufacturer's existing systems and pricing data to evaluate customer inquiries, generate price quotes and manage the back-and-forth communication that typically consumes hours of manual labor.
Co-founder and Chief Executive Jack Strauss identified the problem while working at Northrop Grumman Corp, Bain & Co.'s Advanced Manufacturing practice and autonomous aircraft manufacturer Xwing. He observed that manufacturers could often produce custom parts faster than they could respond to initial customer requests, held back by email-dependent, spreadsheet-heavy back-office operations running on outdated software.
The speed gap carries real business consequences. A 2025 Gartner Intelligence study found that more than 50% of manufacturing firms expect vendors to respond to inquiries within 24 hours. Forgepoint's own research indicates that 78% of companies purchase from whichever supplier responds first.
Strauss and co-founder Alex Pareto spent early 2025 touring Midwest manufacturing plants to understand why RFQ delays persist. They concluded that artificial intelligence could address the administrative friction slowing the process. Frank operates with its own corporate email address, learns each shop's operating procedures, pricing rules and approval workflows, then springs into action when an RFQ arrives by analyzing requests, reviewing attachments and calculating costs based on the company's internal models.
The agent can also flag missing specifications that affect pricing and request clarification from customers, or escalate technical questions to human engineers before finalizing quotes.
We kept meeting manufacturers with strong demand and capable teams, but their best people were spending hours on administrative work. Speed is a competitive advantage, so we built Frank to keep jobs moving and free skilled operators to focus on the decisions only they can make.
Jack Strauss, Forgepoint co-founder and CEO
Early adopters report a 30% average increase in monthly quote throughput and a 55% reduction in the time required to generate quotes.
Forgepoint plans to expand Frank's footprint across more manufacturing operations while exploring additional applications of AI across manufacturing back-office functions.
Forgepoint is giving those teams more capacity, starting with quoting. We backed Jack and Alex because they understand the details of that work and have a clear ambition to bring the same approach across the entire manufacturing back office.
Zach Fredericks, Principal at Primary Venture Partners