Nowadays, a seed-stage startup and 2024 Disrupt Battlefield participant, is revolutionizing the event planning industry with its AI-powered platform. The company has just raised a $2 million party seed round from a cohort of top venture capital firms and angel investors, including Y Combinator, Basis Set Ventures, and Decacorn Capital.

Founded in 2023 by sisters Anna Sun and Amy Yan, Nowadays uses Large Language Model (LLM) AI to automatically plan large, expensive events. The platform leverages a proprietary model based on a combination of OpenAI, Anthropic, and its own coding to email venues, caterers, and other vendors to gather bids. It even makes phone calls to nudge a response to unanswered emails, ensuring a seamless experience for event planners.

The idea for Nowadays was born out of the sisters' own experiences organizing large events during their university days. Anna Sun, CEO, recalls spending hours calling ice cream trucks to get quotes or personally picking up 2,000 McDonald's McNuggets because there wasn't a way to arrange a bulk delivery. She knew she wanted to found a startup to address this pain point, and once Nowadays was admitted into Y Combinator in the summer of 2023, she convinced her sister to quit her job at Google to help her.

Nowadays is aimed at events with budgets of over $20,000 and charges a 5% fee based on the sourced budget. Alternatively, event planners can sign up for an annual subscription. While the platform is most often used for corporate events, it has also been used to plan a wedding and a 50th anniversary, demonstrating its versatility.

The startup's user-friendly interface allows anyone interested in using Nowadays to begin by filling out an intake form to describe the event, location, budget, and any specific needs. The platform's ability to accommodate unique requests, such as meeting spaces with high ceilings, has contributed to its growing popularity among corporate event planners.

Since its launch, Nowadays has been spreading mainly by word of mouth through its early users. One of these users introduced the startup to a venture capitalist, who promptly invested $300,000. Then, the customer wrote a check as well, demonstrating the platform's value proposition.

The $2 million seed round is a testament to the startup's potential in an increasingly crowded field. Established players like Cvent and Eventbrite are adding AI tools to their offerings, while Partiful, a New York-based event-planning app, has been named Google's app of the year. Nevertheless, Nowadays' innovative approach and early traction have positioned it as a promising contender in the event planning space.

With its latest funding round, Nowadays is poised to further develop its platform and expand its user base. As the event planning industry continues to evolve, it will be interesting to see how Nowadays leverages its AI-powered technology to stay ahead of the curve.