As AI transforms how businesses operate, an equally important question is emerging: who verifies the work, and how do we know we can trust it?
For decades, CPA firms have served as critical gatekeepers of financial integrity, independently verifying the information that businesses, investors, and regulators rely on. Yet much of this work remains manual, from gathering evidence and performing substantive testing to preparing workpapers and coordinating with clients.
The profession faces a structural paradox: demand for assurance remains persistent and often mandated by regulation, while firms contend with a shrinking talent pipeline and increasingly complex engagements. We believe AI can fundamentally change this equation and reimagine how assurance work is performed.
That conviction is why Touring Capital is excited to announce our investment in Clark, an AI-native platform building the next generation of assurance infrastructure.
From Software That Records Work to AI That Performs It
Traditional audit software has largely been designed to help professionals organize, document, and manage engagements. While these systems have improved workflows, the underlying work of reviewing evidence, performing testing, and preparing documentation remains overwhelmingly manual.
We believe the next generation of software will look fundamentally different. Rather than simply helping professionals manage their work, AI-native platforms can increasingly execute substantive portions of it.
Assurance is particularly well suited to this transformation. Engagements are recurring, governed by established standards, and built around repeatable, evidence-intensive procedures. These characteristics make assurance a natural fit for agentic AI.
Clark is building this execution layer. Its platform enables CPA firms to automate substantive testing, analyze supporting documentation, and prepare workpapers while adapting to firms’ existing methodologies. Licensed professionals retain responsibility for oversight, judgment, and final sign-off.
The result is a shift from AI as a productivity tool to AI as an active participant in assurance execution.
From Task Automation to Continuous Intelligence
Clark’s latest innovation, Material Intelligence, takes this vision a step further.
Most AI tools are reactive: they complete a task and wait for the next instruction. But assurance engagements are continuous, requiring ongoing coordination across documents, clients, and interconnected procedures.
Material Intelligence is designed to operate throughout an engagement, monitoring incoming documentation, client communications, and ongoing work. When information is missing, it can request documents, track responses, and resume procedures as new evidence arrives.
This is the next evolution of agentic software: moving beyond isolated tasks to continuously coordinate and execute complex workflows across multiple stakeholders.
For CPA firms, this translates into greater capacity, faster engagements, and more time for professionals to exercise judgment and investigate exceptions.
Building the Future of Trust
What excites us most about Clark is the opportunity to build beyond any single audit workflow.
The company’s initial focus on assurance provides a compelling foundation: a large, recurring market with standardized procedures, demanding accuracy requirements, and a clear need for greater execution capacity. As Clark expands across engagement types, we see the potential to establish a foundational AI execution layer for the profession.
But the bigger opportunity extends far beyond audits. As AI accelerates the creation and processing of information, the need for independent verification will only grow. We believe the next generation of assurance infrastructure must operate at the speed and scale of the systems it is designed to verify, without compromising rigor or accountability.
We have been particularly impressed by founder Enes Witwit and his team’s combination of technical ambition and deep understanding of enterprise accounting. Building in a regulated industry requires more than sophisticated AI. It demands the ability to earn the trust of institutions that cannot afford to get things wrong.
With this financing, Clark will expand its product, engineering, and sales teams, bring Material Intelligence to more firms, and broaden its assurance capabilities.
At Touring Capital, we back AI-native companies that don’t just make existing workflows faster, but fundamentally rethink how entire industries operate. Clark embodies that ambition.
AI is changing how information is created. We believe Clark can help change how it is trusted.
We’re thrilled to partner with Enes and the Clark team on that journey.