A Swiss startup, founded four years ago, has secured significant funding to capitalize on the growing trend of “agentic AI”.

Unique announced on Thursday that it has secured $30 million in a Series A funding round, led by London-based VC firm DN Capital and CommerzVentures, the investment arm of Germany’s Commerzbank.

The concept of “agentic AI” is currently one of the biggest trends in technology, although there is no single definition of what an AI agent is. At its core, an AI agent should be capable of more than just simple chatbot functions, with the ability to make decisions and perform various tasks, such as online shopping, filing expense reports, and improving factory efficiency.

Founded in 2021 in Zurich by CEO Manuel Grenacher, CCO Michelle Heppler, and CTO Andreas Hauri, Unique aims to power an agentic AI workforce for financial services, including banking, insurance, and private equity.

This involves automating workflows in areas such as research, compliance, and KYC (“know your customer”). Unique offers a range of customizable AI agents, including an investment research agent that provides answers to natural-language queries using internal and external knowledge.

Another example is the due diligence agent, which analyzes documents such as meeting transcripts and compares them to past evaluations to suggest potential questions for bank personnel to ask.

Initially, the company focused on AI-powered video for sales teams, but over time, it evolved into a “co-pilot for finance teams”. In 2023, Unique went live with Swiss private national bank Pictet, which is also a strategic investor in the company.

Unique’s client list includes other prominent Swiss financial institutions, such as UBP and Graubündner Kantonalbank.

With the new funding of $30 million, Unique plans to accelerate its international expansion, with a focus on the U.S. market. The company has raised a total of $53 million to date.