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Profound
Unicorn · $1BNew York City, US · 20 employees · 10 known investors
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Profound provides tools for PR and brand teams to monitor and influence how their brands appear in AI answer engines like ChatGPT, tracking brand sentiment and citations across domains. It surfaces earned media opportunities and supports generative engine optimization to improve brand visibility in AI-generated responses.
Also known as Profound AI · tryprofound
Founders & leadership
Investors · 10
How we know: globenewswire.com · Not right? Tell us
How we know: Kleiner Perkins's portfolio page · research · tryprofound.com · Not right? Tell us
How we know: Saga Ventures's portfolio page · the VCSheet dataset · research · tryprofound.com · Not right? Tell us
How we know: Script Capital's portfolio page · Not right? Tell us
How we know: Sequoia Capital's portfolio page · research · sequoiacap.com · Not right? Tell us
How we know: South Park Commons's portfolio page · the VCSheet dataset · research · tryprofound.com · Not right? Tell us
How we know: funding news · Not right? Tell us
How we know: deep research dossier: balaji-srinivasan · Not right? Tell us
Funding
SEC filings, press & company announcements$99M disclosed across 3 of 5 rounds · 2025–2026
- $1.5MraisedAug 2026 · 2 sourcesSource ↗
- $1.5MSeed FundingAug 2026 · 2 sourcesSource ↗
- $96MSeries CFeb 2026Source ↗
Source: company announcements and press reports — follow each round's link for the claim.
Valuation · disclosed
Disclosed eventsSource: SEC prospectus filings, and round valuations the company or its investors disclosed — follow each entry's link for the claim.
Company profile
researched Aug 2026Profound is a New York City-based software company whose platform measures and seeks to influence how AI assistants and "answer engines" such as ChatGPT, Gemini, Perplexity, Claude and Grok describe and recommend brands. Its software analyzes how models talk about brands across millions of real prompts, reporting mentions, sentiment, prompt volumes, competitor comparisons and the sources cited in AI answers, so customers can see not only whether they appear in AI-generated responses but why.
The product set spans monitoring and analytics (answer engine insights, prompt volumes, shopping and agent analytics), content creation, and execution. In February 2026 the company launched Profound Agents, which brings orchestration and automation of marketing work — including generating and distributing marketing copy in a brand's voice — natively into the platform, with integrations to tools including HubSpot, Google Workspace, Gamma, Parallel AI and Vercel. Alongside it, Profound announced a broader ecosystem of training, certification, an agency marketplace and Profound University, framed around a new "marketing engineer" role that combines analytics, automation and AI systems.
The company positions the category as answer engine optimization (also referred to as generative engine optimization or AI optimization), an extension rather than a replacement of SEO, and publishes research on the subject, including findings that up to 90% of cited sources in AI answers can change over time and that different models draw on largely distinct source sets.
Founding story
Profound was co-founded by James Cadwallader (CEO) and Dylan Babbs (CTO). The company launched in 2024 and was described as 18 months old at the time of its February 2026 Series C announcement.
Business model
Profound sells its AI visibility and marketing automation platform to enterprises, with published pricing tiers, a demo-led sales motion, and a partner/agency program. It also offers an ecosystem layer including training, certification, an agency marketplace and Profound University.
Traction
More than 700 enterprise customers and 10% of the Fortune 500 as of February 2026, with named users including Target, Walmart, Ramp, MongoDB, U.S. Bank and Figma. One customer, Ramp, was reported to have seen a 7x increase in AI brand visibility for its accounts payable product. The company had fewer than 120 employees at the time of the Series C.
Latest developments
On 24 February 2026 Profound announced a $96M Series C at a $1B valuation led by Lightspeed Venture Partners, launched Profound Agents for in-platform marketing orchestration and automation, and introduced the Profound Ecosystem with training, certification, an agency marketplace and Profound University. It continues to publish research, including an August 2026 study concluding that Claude and Claude Code behave as distinct answer engines.
▸Full profile — market position, technology, go-to-market, geography, history, risks & controversies
Market position
Profound is described by its Series B lead investor as the leader of the emerging answer engine optimization category, and by press coverage as one of the most prominent startups in a crowded 2025-2026 field of AEO/GEO/AIO vendors. It reached unicorn status with a $1B valuation in February 2026.
Profound combines AI visibility measurement with native orchestration and automation, so customers can move from insight to execution within one system rather than exporting data into separate automation tools. Its data covers multiple answer engines and includes source-level attribution and competitor analysis.
Technology
The platform tracks how AI models describe and recommend brands across millions of real prompts across major answer engines, surfacing mentions, sentiment, prompt volume, shopping and agent traffic analytics. Profound Agents adds AI agents that generate and distribute marketing content and automate operational workflows, integrated with third-party tools. The company also runs observational research, such as a study of 24,135 responses comparing Claude and Claude Code as distinct answer engines.
Go-to-market
The company markets through a demo request and self-serve pricing funnel, an agency and partner program, and extensive content and research output (AEO reports, the Profound Index, glossaries, webinars, podcast and events such as a Zero Click World Tour). Its Series C and Series B announcements were placed as exclusives with business press.
Enterprise marketing organizations, including AEO, content, and PR/brand teams, as well as agencies. Named customers include Target, Walmart, Ramp, MongoDB, U.S. Bank, Figma, Charlotte Tilbury, Indeed, DocuSign, Chime, Clay, Plaid, Wayfair, Brex and LG.
Geography
Headquartered in New York City, serving enterprise customers including Fortune 500 companies; runs a multi-city Zero Click World Tour event series.
History
Profound launched in 2024 with tools giving marketing teams visibility into how AI systems describe their brands. In August 2025 Sequoia Capital announced it had led the company's Series B, citing rapid product expansion and enterprise traction less than a year after launch. By early 2026 the company reported more than 700 enterprise customers, and on 24 February 2026 it announced a $96M Series C at a $1B valuation led by Lightspeed Venture Partners, bringing total funding to $155M, together with the launch of Profound Agents and the Profound Ecosystem.
Risks & controversies
Coverage notes the AEO/GEO market has attracted intense hype and a large number of competing entrants in 2025-2026, raising differentiation risk, and that Profound competes for AI talent with leading labs such as OpenAI and Anthropic while operating with fewer than 120 employees. AI-driven discovery is described as highly fluid, with up to 90% of cited sources in AI answers changing over time, requiring continual re-optimization.
Compiled by commissioned research from 6 cited public sources — announcements, filings, and press listed under research sources below.
Key figures
latest reportedCompany-reported or press-reported figures, each dated to when it was claimed — not independently audited.
Timeline · 4
launches, deals, and filingsSeries C led by Lightspeed Venture Partners with participation from Sequoia Capital, Kleiner Perkins, Evantic Capital, Saga VC and South Park Commons; brings total funding to $155M.
$96M source ↗
Profound added native orchestration and automation agents that generate and distribute marketing copy in a company's voice, with integrations including HubSpot, Google Workspace, Gamma, Parallel AI and Vercel.
Introduced training, certification, an agency marketplace and Profound University focused on AI marketing agents and answer engine optimization.
Sequoia Capital announced it led Profound's Series B, citing customers including Fortune 10 companies, Ramp, U.S. Bank, Indeed, MongoDB, DocuSign, Chime, Clay and Plaid.
Dated company events from announcements, filings, and press; legal rows summarize public dockets and regulator releases.
In the news
▸Research sources · 6
primary sources listed
- Profound raises $96M Series C at $1B valuation to build the marketing platform for the AI eratryprofound.com · web
6 public sources were cited for this profile; the first-party ones are listed here.
Frequently asked questions
- What does Profound do?
- Profound builds an AI-era marketing platform that tracks and improves how AI answer engines describe brands.
- Who founded Profound?
- Profound was founded by Dylan Babbs, James Cadwallader.
- Who are Profound's investors?
- Profound's investors include Khosla Ventures, Kleiner Perkins, Saga Ventures, Script Capital, Sequoia Capital, South Park Commons, 3one4 Capital, Balaji Srinivasan and 2 more.
- How much funding has Profound raised?
- Profound has disclosed $99M raised across 3 of its 5 known rounds.
- Where is Profound headquartered?
- Profound is headquartered in New York City, US.