Manny Medina just pulled off one of the most impressive seed rounds of the year. The Outreach founder's new startup Paid closed an oversubscribed $21.6 million seed led by Lightspeed, pushing the London-based company past a $100 million valuation before even reaching Series A. That's a stunning vote of confidence in Medina's bet that AI agents need an entirely new way to charge customers - one based on actual results, not seat licenses.
The numbers tell the story of just how desperate the market is for a solution to AI's billing problem. Paid has now raised $33.3 million total - including a €10 million pre-seed in March - and sources tell us the valuation has already crossed $100 million. That's before the company has even announced a Series A.
The timing isn't coincidental. As AI agents flood the enterprise market, companies are discovering that traditional software pricing models don't work. Per-seat licensing makes no sense when your 'employees' are algorithms. Usage-based pricing could bankrupt agent makers who pay their own fees to model providers and cloud platforms.
'Per-user fees don't work because agent makers pay usage fees to the model providers as well as to cloud providers,' Medina told TechCrunch. 'Unlimited use could drive them into the red.'
The solution Paid is building essentially turns every AI agent into a performance-based contractor. Instead of paying for the privilege of using software, companies pay for specific outcomes - cost savings, revenue generation, efficiency gains. It's a fundamental shift that mirrors how the best human consultants have always charged.
'You need to show the value the agent is delivering to your customers, because agents are running in the background for the most part,' Medina explains. 'If you're a quiet agent, you don't get paid.'
That philosophy is already winning over customers. Artisan, the viral sales automation startup that's been making headlines with its aggressive 'stop hiring humans' marketing, uses Paid's platform. The company just landed ERP vendor IFS as another customer, signaling that established SaaS players see agents as their next growth engine.
The market validation goes deeper than just customer traction. Lightspeed's Alexander Schmitt says his firm has invested 'more than $2.5 billion into AI infrastructure and application layer companies over the last three years' and witnessed the carnage firsthand. A recent found that 95% of enterprise AI projects deliver no value, with only 5% making it to production.
