Openlayer, has successfully raised $14.5 million in a Series A funding round, led by Race Capital, with participation from various other investors. This investment will be strategically used to enhance the platform's enterprise-grade capabilities and to scale its go-to-market strategies across key industries and global markets.
Quick Intel
Openlayer, a unified platform dedicated to the evaluation and governance of AI systems at the enterprise level, has announced a successful $14.5 million Series A funding round. The funding was spearheaded by Race Capital, with significant participation from NXTP, KPN Ventures, Mindset, Y Combinator, Quiet Capital, and Telefonica. This financial infusion will enable Openlayer to significantly expand its suite of enterprise-grade product capabilities and to strategically scale its go-to-market efforts across crucial industries and international markets.
In an era of rapid AI adoption across various business sectors, Openlayer's platform addresses the critical need for ensuring that these complex systems are thoroughly evaluated and held accountable both before and after their deployment. Gabriel Bayomi, CEO and co-founder of Openlayer, highlighted the urgency of this need, stating, "The rate of AI adoption is accelerating rapidly, with teams integrating AI into more mission-critical aspects of their business. When enterprises deploy AI, there's no room for error, especially in customer-facing applications. A single failure can erode trust, disrupt lives, or lead to legal and reputational fallout. That's why robust evaluation, observability, and governance aren't optional – they're foundational to responsible AI deployment."
Openlayer provides enterprises with a unified platform designed to seamlessly transition their AI applications from the initial prototyping phase to full-scale production. This approach not only accelerates the deployment process but also ensures accuracy by proactively identifying and mitigating potential weaknesses within the AI systems. Chris McCann, Managing Partner at Race Capital, noted Openlayer's impressive growth trajectory, stating, "Openlayer's development velocity has been among the fastest in our portfolio – growing nearly 5x in 2024 and on pace to match that this year. Their platform is becoming essential for enterprises that need to move fast without compromising reliability in their AI infrastructure."
Founded by Gabriel Bayomi, Rishab Ramanathan, and Vikas Nair, Openlayer offers a comprehensive platform that supports AI teams throughout the entire development lifecycle, from early experimentation to final production deployment. The platform is versatile, catering to both traditional machine learning models and the rapidly evolving landscape of GenAI systems. Openlayer empowers teams to effectively manage various critical aspects, ranging from addressing data quality issues to conducting complex model evaluations and implementing robust governance frameworks, all within a streamlined, single workflow.
Dror Avrilingi, Head of QE, Data & AI Studios at Amdocs, praised Openlayer's engineering team and collaborative platform, stating, "Openlayer has a world-class engineering team that ships new integrations and features every week. On top of that, the platform is built for collaboration, and even non-technical stakeholders can easily participate in helping ensure products are delivering on their intended promise." Openlayer distinguishes itself as a natively unified platform for both ML and LLM evaluation, offering multimodal testing capabilities, real-time monitoring, and automated governance features that seamlessly integrate into existing enterprise workflows.
Built for enterprise teams deploying everything from traditional ML to Generative AI, Openlayer helps organizations test, monitor, and govern their AI systems with confidence. Founded by Gabriel Bayomi, Vikas Nair, and Rishab Ramanathan, Openlayer is trusted by enterprise companies to operationalize safe, reliable, and responsible AI.