Rory Rawlings co-founded Avalara and led the invention of the original AvaTax engine. He left in 2015 and started Sundry because he found a better way. It reads the statute, not a code, and it is built for small businesses and the small firms that serve them.
Rory Rawlings co-founded Avalara and led the invention of the original AvaTax engine. He left in 2015.
He started Sundry because he found a better way to determine tax. Twenty years ago, technology limited what could be built. Today it opens the door.
The standard approach maps each product to a code, harmonizes the codes across jurisdictions, and turns an address into a point. Putting AI on top of that doesn't change it. It is still a code, a rate table, and a point on a map.
Sundry works from the statute and the parcel. It determines each product on its own, against the statute that actually controls it, and cites it.
That was impossible twenty years ago. Language models can read the law, but they guess. Sundry's patent-pending classification system makes the reading deterministic. The same product, the same statute, the same answer, every time.
Rory will never build a me-too business. Tax software is built for enterprise and high volume. Sundry is built for small businesses and the small firms that serve them, down to the local return.
Those small businesses have the most tax pain, and the industry has basically ignored them. The returns they are most likely to owe are the ones the big engines cover least: B&O, gross receipts, local license, lodging and excise taxes.
Sundry extends the professional. The firm decides, and the client signs off on the Sundry Worksheet.
Sundry starts in Washington, with state and local returns. If you run a small business here, or you serve small businesses as an accountant or bookkeeper, give us a call.