Gushwork sees early traction with AI-powered customer lead search

As AI-driven search tools transform how businesses get found online, India-based startup Gushwork.ai is enabling companies to capture customers from platforms like ChatGPT, Gemini, and Perplexity. Its early progress is starting to attract investor interest.

The two-year-old firm announced it has secured $9 million in a seed funding round led by Susquehanna International Group (SIG) and Lightspeed. B Capital, Seaborne Capital, Beenext, Sparrow Capital, and 2.2 Capital also participated. A source familiar with the deal told TechCrunch the round values Gushwork at a $33 million post-money valuation, a significant increase from its roughly $7.5 million valuation after a $2.1 million pre-seed round led by Lightspeed in July 2023. With this latest investment, Gushwork's total funding now stands at $11 million.

This financing arrives as AI companies, including OpenAI and Perplexity, gradually disrupt traditional web search. This shift has pushed established players like Google to introduce AI-generated overviews and other conversational features. Gushwork is positioning itself to help businesses gain visibility in these new AI-driven discovery channels through its automated marketing agents.

Founded in 2023 by Nayrhit Bhattacharya and Adithya Venkatesh, Gushwork initially focused on helping small and medium-sized businesses outsource workflows using a blend of AI and human expertise. The company later sharpened its focus on search-led marketing after recognizing strong customer demand for improved online visibility.

"Initially, our goal was to help businesses outsource more efficiently and effectively," Bhattacharya explained in an interview. He noted that customer interest in search optimization became impossible to overlook.

Gushwork's platform employs a network of AI agents to automate key marketing tasks. These agents create and update search-optimized content, build backlinks (typically 10-20 per client) through a network of 200-300 partner sites, and track inbound leads via an integrated content management system. Bhattacharya says the objective is to help companies appear in both traditional search results and AI-generated answers without needing a large in-house marketing team.

The startup reports over 300 paying customers, with about 95% based in the U.S. Subscription plans start at $800 per month. Since launching its AI-search focused product roughly three months ago, Gushwork has reached approximately $1.5 million in annualized recurring revenue. The company aims to hit $3-3.5 million ARR within the next three months, growing at a rate of 50-80% month-over-month.

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According to Gushwork's internal data, AI-driven search and chat platforms now drive about 20% of its customers' website traffic. However, these sources generate approximately 40% of all inbound leads, Bhattacharya shared.

He noted that these higher-intent leads are already delivering tangible results. For example, one professional services client has secured contracts worth between $200,000 and $350,000 after using the platform (the client's name was not disclosed). Many users are reportedly seeing significant pipeline growth as AI-driven discovery becomes more prevalent.

Gushwork's current client base largely consists of high-ticket B2B service providers, industrial distributors, and contract manufacturers, predominantly in the U.S. The average subscription ranges from $800 to $900 monthly, translating to an annual contract value of roughly $9,000 to $10,000.

The move toward AI-powered discovery is still emerging but accelerating. Buyers increasingly use generative AI chatbots and AI web browsers to research vendors and products. OpenAI reported in July 2025 that ChatGPT handles about 2.5 billion prompts daily worldwide, with around 330 million originating from U.S. users. Bhattacharya believes this trend is starting to redefine how businesses approach online visibility.

Gushwork intends to use the new capital to grow its engineering team, enhance model accuracy, and scale its go-to-market initiatives. The startup also has a waitlist of over 800 businesses it plans to onboard.

Headquartered in Delaware with an office in Bengaluru, Gushwork employs about 70 people in India, along with several contractors.