My co-founder Jian and I have spent most of our careers in tech and e-commerce at companies like Google and Instacart, seeing digital advertising from both the platform and brand side. We know firsthand how hard it is for companies to generate real returns from ads.
Large enterprises have sophisticated technology, proprietary data, and huge teams that work on their behalf to supercharge their growth. For example, we managed large teams of engineers, operations specialists, and marketing experts, and developed advanced machine learning systems to optimize billions of dollars of ad spend.
In contrast, most businesses have never had that luxury. We see an immense opportunity to help every business thrive with autonomous AI agents that turn data into growth – improving the bottom line while giving business owners and operators valuable time back to focus on other pressing areas. MAI’s technology stack is built specifically to give businesses of all sizes access to the same technology advantage as the world’s best enterprises.
We’ve been hard at work with our dedicated team, and today, we’re thrilled to emerge from stealth with $25M in Seed funding led by Kleiner Perkins, with participation from Amino Capital, Fellows Fund, Gaorong Ventures, Shanda Grab Ventures, UpHonest Capital, Welight Capital, and others.
The funding round will help us expand our product and engineering teams, further increasing our already-impressive talent density, and accelerate development of the MAI platform.
Those who run DTC brands didn’t get started because they wanted to obsess over ads. Yet for most, every day starts with: “How did my ads do last night?” and “How are they doing right now?”
Many have tried tools and agencies, but they don’t truly understand each business; how it shifts across product categories, customer segments, and over time. DTC brands need a system that knows which dollars are working and reallocates spend in real time.
That’s where MAI’s Google Ads agent comes in. It connects Google Ads, Google Analytics, and Shopify, and uses machine-learning models to find which products and audiences are actually making money. Our clients set the goals and guardrails; the agent does the rest. It learns from your past performance, structures campaigns, and optimizes spend in real time, 24/7. And it explains every action in plain language, so our clients always stay in control.
With MAI, businesses can:
Automate Google Ads management: MAI agents set up, monitor, and adjust campaigns continuously without human monitoring.
Optimize in real time: Budgets, bids, and creative assets are dynamically tuned 24/7 to maximize performance.
Adapt to each business: MAI agents learn a company’s unique products, customers, and goals instead of applying one-size-fits-all rules.
Detect issues instantly: From broken discount codes to stockouts, MAI flags problems that impact ad performance before they drain budgets.
Scale efficiently: MAI agents can handle thousands of products and creative variations at once, making enterprise-level complexity manageable for lean teams.
Fast growing brands like Dreo, DrWoof, Fanka, Flamingo, NutritionFaktory, Patpat, Velotric, and Vivaia are already using MAI to manage millions in monthly ad spend, and our agents have helped brands drive 40% or more sales. Many customers have increased their budgets substantially after seeing sustained returns.
If you’re a D2C brand tired of spreadsheets and guesswork, we’d love to show you what always-on agents can do for your business. Join the waitlist at mai.co.
Yuchen, Co-founder and CEO
Media contact: press@mai.co
