OneByZero, a Singapore-based company that deploys and manages artificial intelligence systems inside large enterprises, has raised $20 million in a Series A round led by Jungle Ventures. The financing, announced on 5 October 2026, is the company's first external funding; it has grown to this point without outside investors.
The company plans to use the capital to expand its engineering teams across the nine markets where it already operates, establish a presence in Japan, enter the healthcare and public sectors, and continue developing its software platform. Additional participants in the round were not disclosed.
OneByZero's pitch addresses one of the most persistent frustrations in corporate technology. Over the past three years, large organisations have launched countless AI pilots, but many have struggled to move those experiments into production systems that run reliably at scale, integrate with existing software and satisfy regulators. The company positions itself as the partner that closes that gap.
From pilots to production
Most large companies now have access to capable AI models through cloud providers and specialist vendors. The harder problem lies elsewhere: connecting those models to legacy systems, controlling what they are allowed to do, ensuring their actions can be audited and managing how they interact with human employees. In regulated industries such as banking and telecommunications, those questions are not technical niceties but preconditions for deployment.
OneByZero combines implementation services with a software layer it calls NEO. The platform acts as a control layer for AI agents operating inside enterprise systems. It assigns roles to agents, defines their permissions, connects them to the systems they need to work with and maintains records of their activity. The company also offers what it describes as AI Coworkers, agents designed to work alongside human staff on specific processes such as customer service and back-office operations.
The governance gap
The emphasis on governance reflects a broader shift in how enterprises approach AI. Early deployments focused on chatbots and content generation, where the consequences of errors were relatively contained. The current generation of agentic AI, which can take actions on behalf of users, such as processing transactions, updating records or responding to customers, raises far higher stakes.
An AI agent with access to a bank's core systems must be prevented from taking unauthorised actions, and its decisions must be traceable if something goes wrong. Regulators in Singapore, India, the European Union and elsewhere have been developing expectations around AI accountability, transparency and human oversight. Companies that can provide the controls and records needed to satisfy those requirements are well placed as adoption accelerates.
OneByZero says its approach is producing measurable results. The company reports that its revenue has doubled every year for three years. Some of its deployments automate more than 90% of customer interactions, and certain data modernisation projects have been completed 50% faster than conventional approaches, according to the company.
A regional footprint that includes India
OneByZero serves financial services, telecommunications and retail companies across Australia, India, Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, the United States and Vietnam. That footprint reflects the rapid pace of digital adoption in South and Southeast Asia, where large banks and telecom operators serve hundreds of millions of customers and face strong pressure to reduce costs while improving service.
India is a particularly important arena. Its banks, insurers and telecom companies are among the largest in the world by customer numbers, and many are investing heavily in automation. The country also hosts a large share of global capability centres, the in-house technology hubs of multinational companies, many of which are now building AI capabilities. For a company like OneByZero, Indian engineering talent and Indian enterprise demand are both strategic assets.
Why Jungle Ventures
Jungle Ventures, a Singapore-headquartered venture firm with a significant presence in India, has backed a number of companies across Southeast Asia and India, spanning consumer technology and enterprise software. Leading a first institutional round in a company that has already demonstrated sustained revenue growth without outside capital offers the investor exposure to a business with proven demand, rather than an early-stage bet on an unproven product.
For OneByZero, taking venture capital for the first time after years of self-funded growth suggests that management sees an opportunity that requires faster expansion than internal cash flows can support. The planned entry into Japan, a large enterprise market with an ageing workforce and acute labour shortages, is one example. The move into healthcare and the public sector, both heavily regulated, plays directly to the company's governance-focused positioning.
A crowded but expanding market
OneByZero is entering a competitive landscape. Global consulting firms and systems integrators are building large AI practices, cloud providers are offering their own agent platforms, and a wave of startups is targeting specific enterprise functions. Large software vendors are embedding AI agents directly into their products.
The company's differentiation lies in combining hands-on deployment expertise with a governance platform, and in its familiarity with the regulatory and operational realities of Asian markets. Many global vendors design products primarily for American and European customers; regional specialists that understand local languages, regulations and legacy systems can compete effectively for large accounts.
The broader funding environment is supportive. AI startups have captured the majority of global venture capital in 2026, though investors have become more discriminating, favouring companies with real revenue and clear paths to profitability over those relying on technology demonstrations alone.
Talent will be another determining factor. Building and governing AI agents for complex enterprises requires engineers who understand both modern AI systems and the legacy software that large organisations still depend on. Competition for such people is intense across Asia, and OneByZero's plan to expand engineering teams in all nine of its markets suggests it intends to compete by staying close to customers rather than centralising its workforce in a single hub.
The test ahead
For OneByZero, the challenge will be scaling a business that combines software and services without diluting the quality of its deployments. Services-heavy models can grow quickly but often struggle to achieve the margins of pure software companies. The company's investment in NEO suggests an ambition to shift more of its value into the platform over time.
Its progress will offer a useful signal for the wider market. If enterprises across Asia continue to move AI agents from pilot projects into core operations, demand for the controls and expertise that OneByZero provides should rise. For business leaders weighing their own AI strategies, the company's message is clear: the hardest part of enterprise AI is not choosing a model, but making it work safely within the organisation.
