What it means that OneByZero raised $20 million in a Jungle Ventures-led round — October 5, 2026
· CompaniesAutomation
Radar Flash Edition: OneByZero, which implements AI within banks, telcos, and retailers, raises $20 million with Jungle Ventures. What to demand from your integrator before signing.
Flash Edition. OneByZero, a Singapore-based company that embeds AI into the systems of banks, telcos, and retailers, has closed its first external funding round. It's the small-company version of what we covered in this morning's Radar: the money is going to the people who make AI work.
What happened
OneByZero announced this Monday, October 5, a $20 million Series A led by Jungle Ventures (Source). Founded in 2023, it operates in eight Asia-Pacific countries and the United States, with its engineers working on-site at client offices using NEO, its platform for governing agents (Source). The funds will be used to hire engineers, open a team in Japan, enter healthcare and the public sector, and help clients build their own AI using small, open models.
The performance figures are provided by the company and are unaudited: it claims to double revenue every year, that for some clients it automates more than 90% of certain customer interactions, and that it shortens data modernization projects by up to 50%. It does not disclose client names or revenue figures (Source).
Why it matters
What is being funded is not a model. CEO Niket Vaidya says the value comes when AI runs "inside the systems that run the business, under the company's own rules." CTO Vibhore Kumar says NEO lets companies define "what AI is allowed to do" and where human judgement is required; the platform also logs every action taken by the agents. The models—open and small—are interchangeable parts; the value lies in the rules and logging layer. And if a three-year-old company is already competing with Accenture, Deloitte, or Palantir, AI integration is now a category of its own, and it will see funding rounds, acquisitions and changes of ownership.
For your company
If the value of an implementation lies in the rules and the logs, they must be yours, not the integrator's. Three questions to ask before signing:
- Where do the rules live? What each agent can do and in which cases a person decides, in writing and exportable. If they affect shifts, tasks, or salaries, this is the same sheet that Spain's Royal Decree 723/2026 requires you to explain to your staff, starting today.
- Who owns the logs? The history of what each agent did should remain in your systems even if you switch vendors or models, or your vendor gets acquired.
- 90% of what? If they promise an automation percentage, ask for the denominator: which interactions, out of how many, and measured how.
Without your own logging, a process does not move from INTEGRATED to UNATTENDED on the AI First ladder: someone else runs it, and you can't see it.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is OneByZero?
A Singapore-based company founded in 2023 that deploys AI at large banks, telecom operators and retailers, with its own engineers on site and its NEO platform.
How much has it raised and who is investing?
$20 million in a Series A led by Jungle Ventures, its first outside funding. The valuation and other investors have not been disclosed.
Does it operate in Spain?
No. It operates in Asia-Pacific and the United States, and its next market is Japan. What matters here is how it works, not the vendor.