As AI-powered search tools reshape the way businesses are discovered online, India-founded startup Gushwork helps companies attract customers from platforms like ChatGPT, Gemini and Perplexity — with early traction starting to attract investor support.
The two-year-old startup said Thursday it raised $9 million in a seed round led by Susquehanna International Group (SIG) and Lightspeed, with participation from B Capital, Seaborne Capital, Beenext, Sparrow Capital and 2.2 Capital. The round values Gushwork at $33 million post-money, up from about $7.5 million after a $2.1 million pre-seed led by Lightspeed in July 2023, a person familiar with the matter told TechCrunch. The latest funding brings Gushwork’s total funding to $11 million, the startup said.
The funding comes as AI companies including OpenAI and Perplexity begin to chip away at traditional web search, prompting incumbents like Google to develop AI-generated reviews and other conversational features into their search products. Gushwork is betting that this change will create a new opportunity to help businesses appear in AI-powered discovery channels using their marketing automation agents.
Founded in 2023 by Nayrhit Bhattacharya (pictured above, right) and Adithya Venkatesh (pictured above, left), Gushwork initially focused on helping small and medium-sized businesses outsource their workflows using a mix of artificial intelligence and human expertise. The startup began narrowing its focus on search-based marketing after seeing high customer demand for help with improving online visibility.
“When we started, we focused on helping businesses outsource faster and outsource better,” Bhattacharya told TechCrunch in an interview, adding that the traction around customer search has become harder to ignore.
Gushwork’s platform uses a network of AI agents to automatically create and update search-optimized content, generate backlinks—typically 10 to 20 per client—through a network of approximately 200 to 300 partner sites, and track inbound leads through a comprehensive content management system. The goal, Bhattacharya said, is to help businesses appear in both traditional search results and AI-generated answers without relying on large in-house marketing teams.
The startup says it has signed up more than 300 paying customers — about 95% of them in the U.S. — with subscriptions starting at $800 a month. Gushwork is currently running on about $1.5 million in annual recurring revenue after launching its AI-focused product about three months ago and is targeting $3 to $3.5 million ARR in the next three months, Bhattacharya said, adding that the startup is growing about 50% to 80% every month.
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Across Gushwork’s customer base, about 20% of website traffic now comes from AI-powered search and chat platforms, but those sources account for about 40% of inbound leads, Bhattacharya said, citing the startup’s internal data.
Higher intent leads, Bhattacharya said, are already translating into business results for some customers. In one case, a professional services client closed contracts worth between $200,000 and $350,000 after adopting the platform, he said, declining to disclose the client’s name. He added that many users are seeing significant pipeline growth as AI-driven discovery gains traction.
Gushwork’s customer base today is concentrated among high-ticket B2B service providers, industrial distributors and contract manufacturers, primarily in the US, Bhattacharya said. The startup’s average subscription is $800 to $900 a month, or about $9,000 to $10,000 in annual contract value, he added.
The shift to AI-driven discovery is still in its early stages, but it’s gaining momentum. Tools like genetic AI chatbots and AI-powered web browsers are increasingly being used by buyers to research suppliers and products. OpenAI said in July 2025 that ChatGPT was receiving about 2.5 billion prompts per day worldwide, including about 330 million from US users. Bhattacharya said the trend is starting to reshape how some businesses approach online visibility.
Gushwork plans to use the new funding to expand its engineering team, improve model accuracy and scale its go-to-market efforts, Bhattacharya said. He added that the startup has more than 800 businesses on its waiting list where it plans to launch.
The startup, based in Delaware with an office in Bangalore, has about 70 employees in India, along with several contractors.
