Today, our portfolio company Maisa is announcing a $25M seed investment from Creandum (early backers of Lovable, Spotify, and Klarna) and Forgepoint.
Maisa is at the forefront of the digital workers revolution. They’ve developed a proprietary, hallucination-resistant Knowledge Processing Unit (KPU) that allows digital workers to show their work. No more guessing why an AI worker has made a decision – the KPU generates a traceable “chain of work” that unlocks the AI workforce for enterprises.
We led their pre-seed last year, and are doubling down in this seed round. This is why we believed in this team from Day 0:
Trust Drives Enterprise Adoption
AI workers will transform knowledge work, and the market size is huge. Thoughtful AI workers can displace the robotic process automatic market of roughly $13B, as well as the software market, and the labor markets, creating an additional $5T in value.
But AI workers haven’t materialized en masse yet. Only one in five companies advance AI beyond the proof-of-concept stage, and only 4% of those projects go on to create real value for enterprises.
The issue is that compliance, hallucinations, and the inability to actually see how AI “thinks” keep these projects stuck in innovation labs. The real world is too messy for guesswork. For enterprises to adopt AI, there have to be checks and balances that are not built into most AI products today.
With their KPU and Chain-of-Work system, Maisa was the first team to walk into our office with that problem solved.
Digital Workers, No Code Required
This fundraise coincides with the release of Maisa’s new product, Maisa studio – a no code platform that allows non-technical staff to create AI agents.
You simply describe a task in natural language; the system auto‑generates the workflow, asks clarifying questions, connects to >450 APIs, and begins learning “on the job” via HALP (Human‑Augmented LLM Processing) – a method refined by Maisa.
This no code product is a critical GTM wedge for Maisa for three reasons:
- Speed to value. Early customers went from kickoff to production in three onboarding sessions. AI workers need to deliver value fast to have sticking power.
- Bottom‑up adoption. Non-technical teams can self-serve, creating the bottoms‑up growth loops we seek. (Top-down AI adoption is too slow).
- Network effects. Every new workflow expands Maisa’s connector and skill library, raising switching costs and compounding learning across clients.
A Technical Team with Greater Vision
Maisa CEO David Villalón and CSO Manuel Romero deeply understand the technical requirements of AI agents today.
Villalón was formerly Chief AI Officer at Clibrain and Director of Product at Voicemod. Romero is a top HuggingFace contributor globally, with more than 700 open-source models and 15 million downloads per month.
They have builder’s DNA. It’s how they were able to identify the transparency problem (which has been overlooked by the field) in the first place.
More importantly, the team has the ability to translate deep technical understanding into a product non-technical audiences can instantly understand and apply. This translational skill shows itself in their early traction: Maisa already has enterprise clients operating in high-stakes fields like banking, automotive production and energy.
We’re excited to continue supporting the Maisa team and vision.
Learn more about Maisa here.
Read more about the themes behind their success:
As Founders ourselves, we respect your time. That’s why we built BriefLink, a new software tool that minimizes the upfront time of getting the VC meeting. Simply tell us about your company in 9 easy questions, and you’ll hear from us if it’s a fit.
