Concur co-founders Raj Singh and Mike Hilton are backing a stealthy new Seattle-area startup called SCALA.AI that’s positioning itself at the intersection of customer experience, generative AI, and enterprise operations.
The company was incorporated in June and is just getting off the ground. Singh, who was most recently CEO at Accolade, is co-founder and the executive chairman. Hilton, who helped launch corporate expense giant Concur with Singh and was an exec at Accolade, is an investor.
SCALA is led by CEO Ardie Sameti, a restauranteur-turned-techie who spent nearly a decade leading product teams at Accolade, the healthcare software giant that recently turned private in a $621 million deal with Transcarent.
Sameti didn’t divulge many details about the startup in an interview with GeekWire, but said it’s building a platform with tailored vertical agentic AI solutions to help companies unlock more value from their interactions with customers and customer data.
The startup is targeting various sectors including healthcare, financial services, and retail.
“I think a lot of folks are playing for efficiency and low-level task automation,” Sameti said. “We’re building something much greater than that.”
The customer experience (CX) industry is led by incumbents such as Qualtrics and SurveyMonkey, along with other customer data-focused startups including Seattle startup Amperity. Singh was on Amperity’s board for seven years before departing in November.
Sameti’s journey into the tech startup world is unique. Born in Iran during the Iran-Iraq war, he immigrated to the U.S. with his mother and settled in the Seattle region. His first exposure to business and customer experience came from the hospitality industry, where he worked on back-office tasks and eventually operated restaurants.
Sameti was intrigued by the tech sector and joined Accolade in 2015 as Singh’s assistant. He worked his way up the company and eventually led its AI efforts as a director and VP.
Singh called Sameti the “best single person to reinvent CX in the era of AI,” pointing to Accolade’s success in healthcare as a launching pad for SCALA’s broader ambitions.
“SCALA is taking everything we learned and building a transformative set of tools to create real-time value for exec teams in any industry,” Singh said.
Singh and Hilton co-founded Concur in 1993. The company sold to SAP for $8.3 billion in 2014. Singh and Hilton then joined Accolade in 2015.
Accolade, which provides healthcare delivery, navigation, and advocacy services through employers, went public in 2020. Singh led the company as CEO before stepping down this year in April. Hilton, who was chief product officer, departed in 2023.
“I am more excited about the opportunity to innovate than ever,” Singh said. “This is the best time in history to be an innovator and creator who loves solving problems.”
SCALA has less than 10 employees and is still developing its product. It is working out of a WeWork in Bellevue, Wash.
