Tenkara, a San Francisco, CA-based company building ops agents for USUS manufacturers, has raised $7 million in a funding round led by True Ventures.
The round also saw participation from HF0, WndrCo, Articulate Capital, Night Capital, SF1, Transpose, early Flexport employees, and others.
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The company plans to use the funds to expand its operations and accelerate development.
Tenkara, a company building AI agents for USUS manufacturers, is creating next-generation tools for supply chains. Its agents handle back-office work so small teams can operate like much larger organisations. In its first 18 months, Tenkara secured multiple seven-figure contracts with USUS manufacturers.
Tenkara founder and CEO Benjamin Stern is a manufacturing owner-operator. He started his first company in high school, appeared on Shark Tank, and made a deal with Mark Cuban. Over the next decade, he built two factories from the ground up and managed production for several consumer brands.
A 2020 Thiel Fellow, Stern founded Tenkara to address the broken systems he encountered on the factory floor. He is joined by co-founders Evan Adkins (engineering) and Jonah Stillman (commercialisation), both experienced entrepreneurs. The team is building the company out of HF0, a highly selective startup residency program.
There are about 600,000 manufacturing firms in the U.S., and 98% are small businesses. These companies are built to make products, not to manage complex supply chains. At mid-sized factories, small teams handle sourcing, costs, logistics, and compliance, often while already overloaded. Most don’t have the resources to grow their back-office teams.
As a result, materials cost more than they should, many projects run late, and compliance issues can be “American manufacturing doesn’t have a talent problem—it has an infrastructure problem,” said Benjamin Stern, Founder and CEO of Tenkara. “A small procurement team at a mid-sized factory is expected to do the same work as a large team at a Fortune 500 company. We’re building software to close that gap.”
“American manufacturing doesn’t have a talent problem—it has an infrastructure problem,” said Benjamin Stern, Founder and CEO of Tenkara. “A small procurement team at a mid-sized factory is expected to do the same work as a large team at a Fortune 500 company. We’re building software to close that gap.”
“For the past 20 years, True Ventures has backed founders who deeply understand the problems they’re solving,” said Phil Black, Co-Founder and Managing Partner at True Ventures. “That’s exactly what Ben brings. He spent a decade building manufacturing plants and understands his customers firsthand. This level of insight is rare, and as domestic manufacturing becomes more important, it’s exactly what the industry needs. We believe Tenkara will play a key role in shaping the next generation of American factories.”
About Tenkara
Founded in 2024, by Benjamin Stern, Tenkara builds essential infrastructure for U.S. manufacturers. Its agents automate key operations like supplier sourcing, procurement, compliance, and freight. The founding team has experience building factories, shipping consumer products, engineering systems at Bridgewater, and advising manufacturers like 3M.
About True Ventures
Founded in 2005, True Ventures is a Silicon Valley venture capital firm that invests early in founders when support matters most. The firm manages $4 billion in committed capital across more than 450 companies in areas like AI, software, hardware, cybersecurity, consumer, and digital biology. Notable investments include Veza, Enveda, Iceye, Handshake, Peloton, Duo Security and HashiCorp.
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