Leading Generative AI software testing platform, BlinqIO, announced it secured a funding round of $5 million, led by Boston-based US fund Flint Capital and key executives from Silicon Valley. The capital injection will assist the first-ever AI test automation engineer in rolling operations across the US and help solve major lack in test programmers for enterprises globally. BlinqIO is unique for companies and software teams in that test scripts and maintenance are carried out by generative AI, without the need for any human intervention.
Investors alongside Flint Capital include Inovia Capital Precede Fund I, led by Patrick Pichette, ex-Google CFO and ex-chair of Twitter, and Raif Jacobs, ex-CFO of Deliveroo, TAL ventures and SeedIL. Founded by serial entrepreneurs Tal Barmeir and Guy Arieli, BlinqIO was launched in 2023. The company is headquartered in Delaware, the United States. Its founders Barmeir and Arieli previously founded Experitest and developed its SeeTest SaaS digital test automation platform, which was eventually acquired by TPG and rebranded as Digital.ai.
BlinqIO utilises Generative AI and Large Language Modelling (LLM). Its AI test engineer understands requirements and makes decisions on how to execute them, creating test automation code (playwright) and maintaining it autonomously. In addition, the AI test engineer has multilingual capabilities meaning it works with over 50 different languages, increasing efficiency among websites and apps for banks, travel, airlines, retail and more.
This round is hugely significant as the company plans on opening new US offices, increasing their current staff count of 15. This, in turn, will help larger enterprises launch products more rapidly through utilizing virtual testers who can operate at scale, 24 hours a day.
“We are delighted to have received funding from such leading investors in the industry which will enable us to expand operations across the US," said co-founder Tal Barmeir. "BlinqIO is already making waves in the software development sector, removing the test automation bottleneck and providing immediate feedback to developers which enables lightspeed time to market for new software products. This investment will facilitate further market expansion whilst solidifying BlinqIO's position as a leader in the field of AI-driven autonomous software testing."
The software testing market shows no signs of slowing down, with figures from Technavio revealing that, globally, it is estimated to grow by $15.9 billion by 2027. In addition, figures from Grand View Research show the global automation testing market is on course to grow at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 17.3% from 2023 to 2030.
"Flint Capital is very selective when it comes to choosing startups for investment, focusing on companies it is ready to support on their long development journey," commented Sergey Gribov, General Partner at Flint Capital. "BlinqIO is a promising project both in terms of its product—Generative AI software testing is in high demand on the market—and its founders, whose capabilities we trust. Tal Barmeir and Guy Arieli are successful founders who have exited with a product in a similar industry. We are confident that our collaboration will be long-lasting and successful."
