Dublin startup backed by Miles Ahead Capital and NDRC builds AI-powered platform for EAA compliance as accessibility rules tighten.
DevAlly, a Dublin-based startup helping companies comply with Europe’s new accessibility regulations, has raised €2 million in pre-seed funding led by Miles Ahead Capital, with participation from NDRC, Enterprise Ireland, and several European angel investors. The funding will fuel the expansion of its AI-powered accessibility platform and support hiring as the company scales in Europe and the United States.
Founded in 2024 by Irish entrepreneurs Cormac Chisholm and Patrick Guiney, DevAlly is one of the first startups to help businesses meet the requirements of the European Accessibility Act (EAA), which came into force in June 2025. The regulation, comparable in scope to the GDPR, mandates accessibility standards for digital products, with non-compliance exposing companies to substantial fines.
DevAlly’s platform automates the detection of accessibility barriers such as missing captions, poor colour contrast, and unreadable layouts for screen readers. It also tracks user-reported issues, generates compliance reports, and integrates accessibility directly into software development lifecycles. Unlike traditional audits that rely on consultants, DevAlly blends human expertise with AI and large language models (LLMs) to offer scalable, continuous accessibility testing.
“The thing that surprised us most was that even massive companies were coming to us two weeks before the deadline saying, ‘Oh, we didn’t know anything about this’” said Cormac Chisholm, CEO and co-founder of DevAlly. “Good design is accessible design. One in five people live with a disability, and universal design benefits everyone.”
The startup plans to grow its team from five to fifteen employees by year-end, primarily in Dublin, where it took part in the NDRC accelerator run by Dogpatch Labs for Enterprise Ireland. With Miles Ahead Capital’s backing, DevAlly will also enter the U.S. market, beginning with sales operations in San Francisco, where it forged ties with accessibility leaders during TechCrunch Disrupt’s Startup Battlefield 2024.
“A lot of our customers right now are on the West Coast” said Patrick Guiney, co-founder and Chief Revenue Officer. “We’re positioning ourselves as a bridge to Europe for U.S. companies that want to meet EAA compliance efficiently.”
The timing could not be better. The EAA affects businesses serving the EU’s 450 million consumers, and like the GDPR before it, has left companies scrambling to update websites, e-commerce platforms, and mobile apps. Inaccessible design already carries reputational and legal risks, Spanish airline Vueling was fined pre-EAA for a non-compliant site, while a UX analysis of the top 1,000 U.S. websites found 94% failed basic accessibility standards.
With disability affecting one in five people, and $8 trillion in global disposable income tied to disabled consumers and their households, DevAlly sees accessibility not as a burden but as an opportunity. “The improvements that come with accessibility, like subtitles at Netflix, become massive advancements in how we all use technology” Chisholm said. “It’s a much better form of design.”