Ramp hits $44 billion valuation as companies look to rein in AI spending

Corporate America is trying to figure out how to rein in rising artificial intelligence spending. That's helping payment software giant Ramp . The spend-management company announced a $750 million funding round at a $44 billion valuation on Thursday. The round was led by ICONIQ , GIC and Ontario Teachers' Pension Plan , and marks a roughly 38% step up in Ramp's valuation. The New York-based company crossed $1 billion in annualized revenue, with positive free cash flow, according to CEO Eric Glyman . The growth, in part, is coming from corporate clients grappling with AI spending that is eating up a larger portion of budgets. "What we're finding is tokens cost quite a bit of money and most CFOs not only didn't plan for this in their annual plans — the steep growth — but don't have great tools to manage this," Glyman told CNBC in an interview Thursday. "Suddenly you have this third pillar that has showed up, which is spending through tokens and intelligence. It's not a clean area of spend." Eric Glyman and Karim Atiyeh, cofounders of corporate card startup Ramp Ramp now has a product to help clients manage AI spending. It helps companies route tasks to AI models that can be done at a fraction of the cost. That price for CFOs often comes in the form of paying for "tokens," the units that AI companies use to measure usage. Glyman said CFOs are often surprised at how much they're actually spending. …