How a State Department Program, a CPA With 20 Years of GovCon Experience, and a Tech Founder From Buenos Aires Built WiseCost

In 2020, the U.S. Department of State's Young Leaders of the Americas Initiative (YLAI) paired Alfonso Aguilera — a tech founder from Buenos Aires — with Brian Wendroff, CPA — a veteran and managing partner of a 20-year-old accounting firm in Arlington, Virginia.

The program brings entrepreneurs from across the Americas to the U.S. and matches them with local business leaders for a month-long fellowship. Alfonso and Brian were paired because of a shared interest: using technology to solve problems in accounting.

Neither expected it to turn into a company.

Two very different backgrounds, one shared frustration

Brian Wendroff founded Wendroff & Associates in 2006, after four years of military service — including a tour at the Pentagon for the Secretary of Defense's Office — and work at the International Accounting Standards Board in London. Over two decades, he built the firm into one of Arlington's most recognized CPA practices, serving entrepreneurs, government contractors, nonprofits, and small businesses across Virginia, Maryland, and DC. He was named Top Financial Professional by Northern Virginia Magazine, Top Financial Adviser by Washingtonian Magazine, and Best CPA Firm in Arlington.

Among his clients: dozens of small government contractors trying to do business with the federal government. And for years, Brian watched the same pattern repeat.

These companies — often 5 to 20 employees — needed DCAA-compliant accounting systems to win cost-type contracts. The tools that existed were enterprise ERPs like Deltek and Unanet: powerful systems built for companies ten times their size, costing tens of thousands of dollars a year, requiring months of implementation. His clients were running QuickBooks Online. They didn't want to leave it. They couldn't afford to switch. And there was nothing in between.

Alfonso came from a different world but a parallel problem. In Buenos Aires, he had co-founded Impacto Digital, a nonprofit that grew to work with the United Nations, Disney, and JP Morgan, with offices in Argentina and Costa Rica. He also founded a startup focused on automating accounting processes for small businesses. He understood the gap between what small companies need from their accounting systems and what enterprise tools actually offer.

When the State Department put them together, the conversation turned quickly from mentorship to mutual frustration: why wasn't there a modern, affordable tool that could make QuickBooks DCAA-compliant without replacing it?

From advisory to co-founders

After the YLAI fellowship ended, Alfonso stayed involved with Wendroff & Associates in an advisory capacity — helping Brian's firm automate processes and improve operational efficiency. He saw firsthand how Brian's GovCon clients struggled with compliance. The same questions came up over and over: How do I set up my chart of accounts for DCAA? Can I use QuickBooks for a cost-type contract? What do I need to pass the SF-1408 pre-award survey?

They explored existing tools. None fit. The ERPs were overkill. The lighter tools were incomplete. Spreadsheet-based workarounds lacked the audit trails DCAA requires.

So they built a prototype — a no-code MVP that connected to QuickBooks Online, added DCAA-compliant timekeeping and labor distribution, and posted journal entries back to QBO. They tested it with real contractors from Brian's client base. It worked.

That prototype became WiseCost.

What WiseCost does

WiseCost is a DCAA compliance layer that integrates directly with QuickBooks Online. It adds what QBO lacks for government contractors: time tracking with immutable audit trails, timesheet approval workflows, automated labor distribution that calculates costs to the penny, and journal entry posting directly to QBO's general ledger.

Contractors don't migrate data. They don't abandon QuickBooks. They don't spend months implementing a new system. They connect their QBO account, configure their payroll settings, and start tracking time the same day.

The platform is live and onboarding clients through Wendroff & Associates and other CPA partners. The core technology is patent-pending, filed through Xsensus LLP.

Why this matters for small GovCons

The government contracting market includes thousands of small businesses that want to work with federal agencies but face a compliance barrier that's disproportionate to their size. A five-person company pursuing a $500,000 T&M contract shouldn't need to spend $100,000 on an ERP to be eligible.

WiseCost exists to lower that barrier. Not by cutting corners on compliance — the DCAA requirements are non-negotiable and WiseCost meets all of them — but by delivering compliance through the tools contractors already use, at a price that makes sense for their stage.

Brian brings 20 years of CPA experience serving GovCon clients and a deep understanding of what auditors actually look for. Alfonso brings the technology to automate it. Together, they're building the tool Brian wished existed for the past decade.

What's next

WiseCost raised initial funding from angel investors in the government contracting and defense technology space. The team is focused on expanding the platform's capabilities, growing the CPA partner network, and publishing educational content to help small contractors navigate DCAA compliance — regardless of what tools they use.

The company is headquartered in Arlington, Virginia — in the same building as Wendroff & Associates, where the collaboration started.