Seattle startup Casium, which uses artificial intelligence to streamline the work visa application process, raised $5 million in seed funding.
The round was led by San Francisco-based Maverick Ventures, with participation from Seattle’s AI2 Incubator, GTMfund, Success Venture Partners, and Jake Heller, co-founder of Casetext, now part of Thomson Reuters.
Casium, spun out of AI2 Incubator in April 2024, is led by founder and CEO Priyanka Kulkarni, a former Microsoft scientist and entrepreneur-in-residence at AI2 Incubator who wanted to fix a problem that she herself experienced while applying for an EB-1 visa.
“Casium started from frustration, from my own experience with a process that was confusing, opaque, and full of endless back and forth,” Kulkarni wrote in a LinkedIn post on Monday. “What began as a personal pain point became a mission to build something better. Today, that mission has grown into a solution helping global talent and the companies that hire them move forward faster with transparency and expert-led precision at every step.”
Applying for work visas requires applicants and employers to make their case to the U.S. government for why the individual is deserving of the opportunity, citing education, work experience and other factors.
The process and paperwork can be time-consuming even with the help of an outside law firm, and Kulkarni’s goal was to shrink the timeline from months down to days.
The Casium platform uses algorithms to first assess the best route for an applicant, which could be a temporary work visa or seeking permanent residency. The startup uses AI to autonomously gather information for an application and prepare the document. Casium works with immigration attorneys to guide the process and represent the visa applicants.
Casium offers initial assessments for free and charges a flat fee for filings based on visa type and case complexity, Business Insider reported. Kulkarni said the company is also developing a subscription model to give employers more options for ongoing support.
The startup, which employs nine people, says it is already working with employers from early stage startups to Series F companies and has assisted hundreds of candidates through visa assessments, compliance reviews, and actual filings, and maintains what it calls “an exceptionally high approval rate.”
“Every filing and every approval is a reminder of why this work matters,” Kulkarni said in calling out Casium’s customers on LinkedIn.
The spotlight on work visas ratcheted up last month when President Donald Trump announced an executive order outlining a $100,000 fee for H-1B visas, which allow companies to hire highly skilled foreign workers in “specialty occupations” such as software engineering, data science, and other STEM fields.
Casium said more than 442,000 workers compete for just 85,000 H-1B visa slots annually. The high-stakes process underscores the company’s potential appeal.
Other companies are working to improve the legal immigration experience — including fellow Seattle startup Boundless Immigration, which spun out of Pioneer Square Labs in 2017 and helps immigrants connect with lawyers and file applications for spousal visas and U.S. citizenship. Boundless has raised more than $43 million and is one of the largest consumer-focused family immigration companies.
Previously: ‘I really want to fix this’: Microsoft vet launches Seattle startup to transform work visa applications
