Asana Snaps Up Stack AI to Accelerate No-Code AI

Asana has announced its acquisition of Stack AI, a company specializing in workflow automation, a move revealed on Thursday following the market close. This strategic purchase is part of Asana's broader initiative to solidify its position as an AI-native workplace platform. Stack AI’s co-founders, Tony Rosinol and Bernard Aceituno, will integrate into Asana’s team as part of the deal, the financial terms of which were not disclosed by the company.

Asana framed the acquisition as a pivotal element of its comprehensive AI strategy, aiming to transform its platform into "the operating system for human-agent teams."

The announcement was strategically timed to coincide with Asana’s quarterly earnings report and investor conference call.

Built as an AI workflow-automation system, Stack AI develops intelligent agents designed to operate within existing business systems, seamlessly extracting data from platforms like Salesforce, Slack, and Google Workspace, among others. The startup, which was a part of Y Combinator’s Winter ’23 cohort, has navigated a highly competitive landscape, facing off against established automation tools such as Zapier and advanced AI labs including OpenAI and Anthropic.

According to Pitchbook data, Stack AI had raised just under $20 million in funding, with the majority, $16 million, secured in a recent Series A round. This round saw investments from Gradient, Epaklon Capital, Lobby VC, LifeX Ventures, and Vercel CEO Guillermo Rauch.

While Asana is widely recognized for its work management system, the company has proactively launched several AI-oriented products in recent years. These notable offerings include the AI Studio agent builder and the AI Teammates series of pre-built automations. Despite the availability of similar tools from major AI laboratories, Asana considers its deep integration into existing corporate workflows a crucial advantage, enabling it to distill unique context and training data that would otherwise be inaccessible.

Asana has encountered difficulties in the public markets during the AI era, experiencing a decline of over half its market capitalization since the introduction of ChatGPT. This downturn was further exacerbated by the departure of founder Dustin Moskovitz from the CEO position last March. However, revenues have continued to grow steadily, and the current leadership expresses confidence that its new human-agent products will drive a significant rebound.

“This acquisition significantly accelerates our product roadmap and propels us into the next frontier of human-agent collaboration,” stated CEO Dan Rogers. He added, “We are already observing substantial momentum with our AI Teammates and AI Studio offerings. Stack AI now empowers us to expand even further, 'agentifying' the most intricate business processes from inception to completion.”