Oslo-based construction technology startup Volve has raised $3 million in seed funding to expand its AI-powered construction tendering platform from the Nordic countries into the UK and Continental Europe.

The round was led by Skyfall Ventures, with participation from J12, Norrsken Evolve, OBOS Ventures, Antler and StartupLab. Angel investors including former OBOS CEO Daniel Kjørberg Siraj also participated.

Founded in 2024 by Abyl Ikshanov, Alf Jørgen Dovland and Herman Smith, Volve focuses on the tendering and preconstruction stage of construction projects, where the company says around 80% of a project's final cost is determined.

Volve's platform helps contractors analyse specifications, drawings, requirements and risk clauses that are often spread across hundreds of documents.

The platform maps project scope, requirements and risks to help contractors decide whether to bid, determine pricing and evaluate the risks associated with a project.

Volve says its technology has handled tenders involving as many as 213 documents and helped compare bids from 73 subcontractors for a single project.

The company is already being used by leading Nordic contractors across more than 2,500 construction projects.

CEO and co-founder Herman Smith brings more than a decade of construction and preconstruction experience and previously served as chief digital officer at engineering consultancy Multiconsult.

Co-founders Abyl Ikshanov and Alf Jørgen Dovland bring backgrounds in AI engineering and commercial consulting, respectively.

Volve is targeting a European construction industry worth more than €1.6 trillion annually, where tendering remains heavily dependent on PDFs, fragmented documents and institutional knowledge.

The company differentiates its platform through a knowledge graph designed to retain information from previous projects and use accumulated project knowledge in future tenders.

Volve competes with construction AI and tendering platforms such as Brainial and Altura, which are also developing tools to automate bid management, tender analysis and risk identification.

The new funding will be used to improve Volve's platform for main contractors and public-sector clients while expanding its presence across the UK and Continental Europe.

The company's next challenge will be adapting its technology to different procurement rules and tendering processes across European markets.

Volve's broader ambition is to turn construction tendering from a document-heavy process into a data-driven commercial intelligence layer that helps contractors make better decisions before projects begin.