Key facts
- Orbio has raised $21 million in a Series A funding round led by Dawn Capital.
- The startup uses AI agents to automate hiring and onboarding for frontline workers.
- Orbio's AI agents can interview candidates, assess fit, monitor output, and conduct daily check-ins.
- Current customers include Poke, YUM! Brands, and The Stepping Stones Group.
- The company has raised a total of $26 million to date.
Orbio, an enterprise startup founded in 2025 by Sergi Bastardas, Nacho Travesí, and Antonio Melé, has announced a $21 million Series A funding round led by Dawn Capital. The company utilizes AI agents to automate and streamline the hiring, onboarding, and ongoing management of frontline workers, a segment of the workforce often underserved by traditional HR technology.
Bastardas, who previously worked at Amazon and floriculture startup Colvin, identified a gap in efficient "human infrastructure" for managing behind-the-scenes workers. Orbio's AI agents, named Maria, Daniel, and Claire, are designed to handle a range of tasks throughout an employee's lifecycle. These include interviewing candidates, assessing their suitability for roles, monitoring daily output, and conducting regular check-ins. The goal is to enable businesses to operate their workforces more autonomously while enhancing employee engagement and support.
Customers like Poke and YUM! Brands are already using Orbio's platform for onboarding and managing their frontline employees. Bastardas noted that clients are progressing from pilot phases to full deployment, citing The Stepping Stones Group, a behavioral health provider, where Orbio now manages the company's entire US operation, resulting in a 20% increase in hired candidates.
The AI agents generate data that creates a feedback loop, informing recruiting quality based on onboarding signals, recalibrating hiring criteria from exit interviews, and identifying retention risks through engagement data. Orbio positions itself against legacy management approaches, which often rely on fragmented processes like spreadsheets and phone calls, particularly in industries such as healthcare, retail, and logistics.
With this latest funding, Orbio has raised a total of $26 million, with previous investors including Visionaries and 2100 Ventures. The new capital will be allocated towards hiring and further developing its AI agent capabilities. Bastardas emphasized the transformative potential for both businesses and the workforce, highlighting that the 2.7 billion frontline workers globally, many without corporate email addresses, are now entering their "AI moment."