Agentio is stepping into its next phase of growth after raising forty million dollars in fresh funding. The new round is led by Forerunner and lands at a moment when the creator economy is moving faster than ever. Views on sponsored YouTube videos have jumped by more than a quarter over the past year. The number of branded videos has grown even faster. Advertisers continue to shift budgets from traditional media into creator driven marketing. That momentum is pushing platforms like Agentio into the spotlight.
The company has now secured three funding rounds in three years. This latest Series B round brings its total raised to fifty six million dollars. With the new investment, Agentio is now valued at three hundred and forty million dollars. The startup began in twenty twenty three, built by Arthur Leopold, who previously served as president at Cameo, and Jonathan Meyers, a former Spotify engineer who worked on automated content marketing systems. In the past year alone, the business has grown more than five times.
Agentio connects brands with YouTube creators for sponsored content. The platform helps advertisers find creators who offer trust, influence and strong engagement. That trust is becoming even more valuable as AI made content fills social feeds. Brands now know that real creators can still move people in ways automated content struggles to do. Agentio has built its business around that insight.
The company said that brands using its platform are seeing major improvements across sponsored video campaigns. Bombas, a socks and apparel brand, recorded more than five times better return on ad spend through Agentio. It also saw a ninety percent rate of net new customers compared with its results on other video platforms. Agentio also found that advertisers who normally take half a year to use up their budgets on Meta or Google can now do it in just a few months through its marketplace while still getting better performance.
Leopold said that the biggest challenge before Agentio arrived was simple. Brands did not know how to partner with creators at scale. He said the original idea was to let AI automate the buying process and deliver stronger results. As more AI content spreads across social platforms, that belief has only grown. Creators carry trust. And even in an AI heavy world, trust is something brands still want more than anything else.
Agentio has paid creators tens of millions of dollars so far. The company did not share exact numbers but said creators on the platform have more than doubled their brand earnings within six months of joining. The time it takes for a creator to receive their first bid has also dropped sharply. Last year it took forty five to fifty days. Today it can happen in less than twenty four hours. This shift comes from having more creators and more advertisers on the platform which improves matching speed and earnings.
The company has also been building new AI features to help both brands and creators work more efficiently. It has focused on reasoning models and multimodal understanding. Through these models, Agentio created an AI campaign manager that helps marketers shape campaigns and refine their briefs. It also rolled out a brand safety matching tool last year. That tool helped brands find creators who fit their safety and content guidelines automatically.
This year Agentio introduced an AI content review system. It checks each draft video before upload and ensures that creators followed the brief. It also evaluates whether the video is safe for the brand. Meyers explained that companies used to assign a person to watch every creator video one by one. With the new system, the review happens in seconds which enables larger campaigns and faster approvals.
Because of its deeper data matching, the company has been able to connect brands with creators they may have overlooked before. A supplement brand might usually pick fitness creators. Yet Agentio could recommend creators who work outdoors or speak to lifestyle audiences. These matches often perform well because they reach people who have the right interests but sit outside the usual categories. While most of its clients are still consumer brands, Agentio has started to see growing interest from B2B companies as well.
After two years of focusing mainly on YouTube, the company is now moving into other platforms. It has begun beta testing campaigns on Meta properties especially around Reels and other short form video formats. The platform will connect brands with creators and help them run partnership ads that do not appear directly in the main feed. This opens new distribution routes for advertisers.
Many creators on Agentio already have strong followings on Instagram which makes scaling on Meta easier. Looking ahead to twenty twenty six, the company plans to support TikTok and Snap. This next phase will bring Agentio closer to becoming a multi platform creator marketplace rather than a YouTube first service.
Forerunner managing partner Eurie Kim said the firm had been watching Agentio for more than a year. The VC had introduced the startup to several brands in its portfolio. Those brands quickly became active customers which signaled to the firm that Agentio had the potential to become a new kind of AI powered media planning platform. Kim said that creators have become one of the most valuable marketing assets of the future and Agentio is building the infrastructure around that shift.
Since last year, the startup has expanded its team from twelve people to thirty five. It plans to grow to more than one hundred employees next year as it scales its product and global footprint. With more brands moving their budgets into creator partnerships and with AI tools improving how those partnerships are managed, Agentio sees a wide path for continued expansion. As the creator economy keeps reshaping modern advertising, the company believes its approach will help brands reach people with more speed, more trust and more accuracy.
