As consumers ditch Google for ChatGPT, Peec AI raises $21M to help brands adapt

With more consumers turning to ChatGPT instead of Google for answers, product discovery is shifting — and that shift has quickly made Peec AI one of Europe’s fastest-rising startups. The Berlin-based company, which helps brands track and improve their presence inside AI-driven search results, has secured a $21 million Series A just four months after its seed round led by 20VC.

The new funding was led by Singular, and although CEO Marius Meiners didn’t disclose the exact valuation, he confirmed that it has tripled and now sits above $100 million.

The momentum is significant: Peec AI has reached over $4 million in annual recurring revenue within just 10 months of launch and now serves 1,300 companies and agencies. Its customers rely on the platform to understand how their brands appear within AI search engines, including ranking, visibility, user sentiment, and the sources that influence generated responses.

These insights power what Peec AI calls generative engine optimisation (GEO) — the AI-age equivalent of SEO — helping marketing teams strengthen their presence in ChatGPT and other AI-powered search tools. The company says it is onboarding around 300 customers each month and plans to accelerate this further with the new capital.

The Series A also attracted support from Antler, Combination VC, identity.vc, and S20. The startup plans to hire around 40 new team members within the next six months, with most roles based in Berlin. Meiners met co-founders Tobias Siwonia (now CTO) and Daniel Drabo (now CRO) during Antler’s Winter 2024 cohort.

Competition is emerging quickly, with startups like Profound in New York and OtterlyAI in Austria entering the GEO ecosystem. To stand out, Peec AI is leaning on a mix of fast expansion, strategic hiring, and high visibility — including running large outdoor ads across Berlin — while preparing to open a sales-focused office in New York City in the second quarter of next year.

Peec AI’s dashboard aims to stay simple even as AI search evolves rapidly. Instead of keyword tracking, the platform organises brand monitoring around prompts—the types of questions brands want to rank for. Pricing starts at €75 per month for 25 prompts ($87) and €169 per month for 100 prompts ($196), both with free trials. Enterprise plans begin at €424 per month ($493).

To help companies act on the data, Peec AI also recommends visibility-boosting strategies. For example, a brand wanting to appear in a query like “best CRMs for fast-growing companies” might be advised to participate in relevant Reddit discussions such as r/CRM.

The startup’s source insights — identifying which publications or content categories influence AI answers most — are central to this strategy. Interestingly, Peec AI notes that mentions in top-tier media don’t automatically outperform those in smaller niche publications when the latter are more closely aligned with the search question, such as “the best healthcare investors in Berlin.”

Well-known companies already using Peec AI include Axel Springer, Chanel, n8n, ElevenLabs, and TUI. As generative search grows across both B2C and B2B sectors, the demand for better brand visibility inside ChatGPT and similar tools continues to expand.

Behind the scenes, Peec AI processes large volumes of raw AI search data to isolate brand- or purchase-related queries. According to Meiners, this proprietary data pipeline — not just the analytics layer — is becoming one of the company’s most significant competitive advantages.

Peec AI’s rise underscores a broader industry trend: the AI value chain isn’t limited to model building. The application layer and high-quality structured data are becoming prime opportunities for European startups — and Peec AI is now firmly at the centre of that movement.