According to a report by The Verge, Ramp, an expense management startup, is currently competing for a U.S. government contract. Their focus is on making federal spending work more efficiently. This new initiative follows Ramp co-founders Eric Glyman and Kyle Harrison writing a blog post, The Efficiency Formula. In it, they spelled out pragmatic, concrete ways the federal government could and should be eliminating inefficient, irresponsible, outdated spending.
The blog post has garnered attention in light of Ramp’s consideration for a charge card pilot program by the U.S. government’s General Services Administration (GSA). SmartPay, the government’s internal expense card program, has a whopping $700 billion ceiling. Ramp’s proposal would go a long way to greening and streamlining this program to eliminate wasteful spending on superfluous projects.
Lindsay McKinley, a spokesperson for Ramp, verified the urban mobility startup’s deep engagement with a typical Request for Information (RFI) process. This move is included in their application to join the SmartPay pilot program. “From that point onward we’ve been able to showcase the product and have made it into a typical RFI process,” said McKinley. She highlighted the competitive nature of the procurement process. “By having Ramp competing for the SmartPay pilot program, it just shows how robust of a solution we have,” she explained.
The contract for this charge card pilot program will be as much as $25 million. This creates a huge opportunity to make Ramp one of the best! However, McKinley noted the uncertainty surrounding the selection process, remarking, “We have no indication of whether we’ll be selected.”
In a short time, Ramp has achieved extraordinary disruption in the financial technology landscape. Collectively, they’ve gone on to raise more than $1 billion in equity financing and lined up $700 million more in committed debt funding. The firm can point to a very strong list of well-known backers. Notable backers include Peter Thiel’s Founders Fund, Keith Rabois of Khosla Ventures, and Thrive Capital, which was founded by Joshua Kushner. Other well-connected investors include 8VC’s Joe Lonsdale and former Florida Governor Jeb Bush.
At the time, McKinley spoke confidently of Ramp’s impressive power. He continued, “Ramp’s technology has saved billions of dollars from being wasted across the economy. If chosen, we’ll bring those same results to bear for the American taxpayer.”
As Ramp navigates this significant opportunity with the GSA, its focus remains clear: enhancing efficiency and reducing unnecessary spending within one of the largest expense card programs in the country.
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