Town raises $55M Series A for personalised AI assistants
What's the deal? Town, a startup building deeply personalised AI assistants, has raised a $55 million Series A led by Andreessen Horowitz. Forerunner Ventures, First RoundDealroom has a profile for this one. Try Dealroom →, Alt CapitalDealroom has a profile for this one. Try Dealroom →, and ConvictionDealroom has a profile for this one. Try Dealroom → also participated.
The company was founded in late 2024 by Jean-Denis Grézé, former chief technology officer of PlaidDealroom has a profile for this one. Try Dealroom →, and Tony Vincent, former director of applied AI at Google. Town is approaching 10,000 users.
Its core idea: most people barely use AI because existing tools aren't connected to their lives. Town requires users to link email and calendar from the start, then builds a profile and begins suggesting actions before they're asked. Over time, its assistants — called "Townies" — learn preferences, spot patterns, and offer to handle tasks automatically, like generating research briefs on unknown email senders or translating documents.
Why now? The global AI assistant market was valued at $16 billion in 2024 and is projected to reach $74 billion by 2033. The productivity software layer beneath it is already a $110 billion business. Yet, as Grézé points out, even power users typically interact with ChatGPT or Claude just three times a day.
"They just don't have good intuition for what AI can or can't do," Grézé told Fortune. "Those systems aren't connected to everything they use."
Town targets what Grézé calls "prosumer" users — people whose personal and professional lives blur together. About 70–80% of usage is work-related. The company has a notable community of Australian plumbers; one user said he gets 300 emails a day spanning emergencies, job sites, new clients, and supplier bills. Town sorts all of it.
What could go wrong? Town builds on Google and Microsoft infrastructure — the same companies fielding their own AI assistants with far deeper native data access. Grézé acknowledges the risk but points to precedent: Superhuman competes directly with Gmail and hasn't been locked out, while Notion has built hundreds of millions in revenue on top of Google Docs.
"Even Google, to build a competing product, has to benefit from the entire ecosystem being open," he said.
Forerunner founder Kirsten Green argues focus is Town's edge. "There is a lot to be said for just being focused on delivering on a particular value proposition to a particular type of user," she said.
The signal: A $55 million Series A for a company founded only in late 2024, still in the early growth stage with fewer than 10,000 users, underscores how aggressively top-tier funds are racing to back the AI "context layer" — the integration-first approach that sits between foundation models and daily workflows. Andreessen Horowitz leading alongside consumer-focused Forerunner Ventures suggests conviction that the winner in personalised AI won't be the smartest model, but the one most deeply embedded in a user's digital life.
Read more: wdctv.news
