Prime Highlights :
- Nous Research is raising at least $75 million at a $1.5 billion valuation, led by Robot Ventures with USV participating.
- Hermes has become a major open-source hit, with nearly 214,000 GitHub stars and 40,000 forks.
Key Facts :
- Nous Research was founded in 2023 and had raised $70 million before this round from investors like Paradigm and OSS Capital.
- Hermes offers built-in skills, self-learning capability, and a cloud-hosted version priced between $20 and $200 monthly.
Background :
Nous Research, the startup behind the open-source Hermes agent, is finalising a new funding round led by Robot Ventures, with strong participation from USV and other major investors, at a valuation of $1.5 billion. The company is raising at least $75 million and drew high interest from investors, according to people familiar with the matter.
Nous Research declined to comment, while USV and Robot Ventures did not respond to requests for comment.
Jeffrey Quesnelle, Karan Malhotra, Ryan Teknium, and Shivani Mitra launched the business in 2023. It had previously raised a total of $70 million from investors including Paradigm, Robot Ventures, North Island Ventures, OSS Capital and Balaji Srinivasan.
Nous Research launched Hermes weeks after a rival personal AI assistant went viral. Hermes shipped with built-in skills such as web search, coding and image understanding, and was designed to learn from usage and build new skills automatically. The startup has also released language models focused on coding and math.
Like similar tools, Hermes lets users automate tasks and interact with agents through apps such as Telegram and Discord, allowing round-the-clock remote use. The open-source project has gained close to 214,000 stars and nearly 40,000 forks on GitHub. It can run on a desktop or virtual private server, though Nous also offers a cloud-hosted version through paid tiers ranging from $20 to $200 a month.
Sources said the new funding would help expand Hermes’ products and business model further.