On February 26, 2026, agent-driven AI marketing startup Gushwork AI announced it raised $9 million in a new seed funding round led by Susquehanna Asia Venture Capital, with continued support from existing backers including Lightspeed Venture Partners, B Capital, Seaborne Capital, Beenext, Sparrow Capital, and 2.2 Capital.
This fresh capital brings Gushwork’s total raised to around $11 million and comes at a pivotal moment when businesses increasingly look to AI-driven search and engagement tools to fuel discovery and growth.
Gushwork builds and deploys autonomous AI marketing agents that help small and medium enterprises (SMEs) and larger B2B businesses improve visibility on emerging AI-powered search engines like ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, and Perplexity — platforms where users increasingly seek recommendations and vendor information.
The Rise of AI Search as a Marketing Channel
Gushwork’s vision centers on the belief that businesses must adapt marketing strategies for a future where AI engines shape discovery. Data from OpenAI shows ChatGPT alone handles over 2.5 billion prompts per day, underscoring the scale of AI-centric queries.
Founders argue that buyers have already started asking AI assistants for vendor recommendations instead of relying solely on traditional search engines, referrals, or sales outreach. They predict that by 2028, AI’s recommendations will dominate vendor selection decisions for many B2B purchases.
This shift demands solutions that help businesses appear naturally within AI-driven answers and suggestions, not just conventional search listings. Gushwork positions its platform squarely to serve that need.
How Gushwork’s Platform Works
Gushwork uses autonomous AI agents that integrate directly with a company’s website and content infrastructure. These agents monitor, generate, and optimise content so that AI search engines evaluate and cite client websites as authoritative when users ask relevant questions.
The platform evaluates how AI engines interpret content quality, topical relevance, and authority signals. It then fine-tunes content creation and distribution to match evolving search criteria used by platforms like ChatGPT, Gemini, Perplexity, and Claude.
Gushwork balances automation with data-driven strategy. While AI handles large-scale content and optimisation tasks, the founders maintain that human expertise guides strategy and quality assurance where necessary.
Real-World Impact and Early Traction
Gushwork reports compelling early outcomes for customers. Over 300 businesses currently use the platform, and another 800+ companies sit on its waitlist, reflecting strong demand.
According to the company, 80% of users see up to a 500% increase in website impressions within the first 60 days of deployment. Inbound leads often rise by roughly 50% in the same timeframe.
On average, clients start generating 10–15 qualified sales inquiries per month by the third or fourth month of using the platform. Those inquiries can translate into significant revenue — customers often record $30,000–$50,000 in ROI from subscription fees that range from $800 to $2,500 per month.
These results suggest that AI-first lead generation is not just promising in theory but delivering measurable business value early in adoption.
Funding Purpose: Growth and Product Development
Gushwork plans to allocate the $9M investment to several key areas:
1. Accelerate Product Innovation
The company will deepen its AI capabilities, improve agent accuracy, and evolve performance metrics. Improving how agents interpret AI search signals will support better client outcomes.
2. Expand Engineering Talent
Gushwork intends to grow its engineering team significantly, hiring specialists who can refine algorithms, enhance integration capabilities, and scale its platform.
3. Scale Go-to-Market Operations
The startup will invest in global sales and marketing efforts to accelerate customer acquisition, especially in the B2B sector where demand for AI discovery tools remains nascent but rapidly growing.
Future plans may include adding performance-linked pricing alongside subscriptions to align cost with client success and broaden appeal for businesses of different sizes.
Strategic Positioning in a Changing Landscape
Digital marketing and SEO must adapt fast to the ways AI engines assess information, relevance, and authority. Traditional keyword-based SEO no longer suffices when AI assistants interpret semantic meaning, context, and user intent to craft answers. Gushwork’s autonomous agents work within this paradigm, creating and perfectly positioning content so AI platforms cite company websites as credible sources.
The startup’s leadership believes companies that ignore this shift risk losing visibility, especially in B2B ecosystems where buyers increasingly turn to AI for vendor selection. Helping businesses appear in AI recommendations could redefine how marketing teams think about discovery, visibility, and lead generation.
Founders’ Vision and Industry Insight
Gushwork co-founders Nayrhit Bhattacharya and Adithya Venkatesh built the company in 2023 with a clear thesis: AI search will become a primary discovery channel, not a fringe trend. By focusing on agent-level automation, they hope to deliver a competitive edge for their customers.
Bhattacharya has compared the shift to the early 2000s when businesses first grappled with Google SEO. Just as companies eventually optimized for Google rankings, the founders foresee a future where businesses must adapt for AI search engines to remain competitive.
Their platform reflects this belief by addressing not only visibility but also ongoing optimisation and adaptation as AI models evolve over time.
Competitive Edge and Challenges Ahead
Gushwork enters a fast-evolving market with competitors on both technical and conceptual fronts. Some firms build tools to optimise human SEO and content marketing, while others pursue AI-integrated marketing automation.
Gushwork’s competitive edge lies in its agentic focus — systems designed to understand how AI crawlers interpret and cite content, along with ongoing automation that learns and adjusts over time. That technical moat allows the startup to tap early traction and build strong customer case studies.
However, the team must remain vigilant. AI search models evolve quickly. What works today might require refinement tomorrow. Constant innovation and AI model monitoring will define long-term success.
Broader Implications for SMEs and B2B Firms
SMEs and mid-market B2B companies often lack resources to compete with larger enterprises in digital marketing. Platforms like Gushwork level the playing field by automating lead discovery, optimising visibility on AI search platforms, and turning passive online assets into proactive customer-acquisition tools.
In an era where traditional sales funnels face disruption, AI-powered discovery offers a new path to growth, especially for companies willing to embrace technological change.
Final Take: A New Chapter in Marketing
Gushwork’s $9 million seed round underscores investor confidence in the startup’s vision and in the broader shift toward AI-centric discovery and lead generation. By positioning itself at the convergence of artificial intelligence, digital marketing, and autonomous automation, the company stands poised to help businesses navigate a market where AI engines increasingly influence purchasing decisions.
If Gushwork continues evolving its technology while delivering measurable results for clients, it could shape how future marketers approach visibility, discovery, and customer acquisition in an AI-first world.
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