Outreach founder Manny Medina has a new startup that helps AI agents get paid

Outreach founder Manny Medina has a new startup that helps AI agents get paid

Manny Medina, the celebrated founder and former CEO of Outreach, is on to something new. As businesses increasingly rely on AI agents, startups like his new venture Paid are emerging to offer solutions that ensure these digital workers are compensated correctly and profitably. With Paid, companies now have a platform that goes beyond traditional software billing models.

Outreach founder Manny Medina has a new startup that helps AI agents get paid

Paid isn’t about creating AI agents—it’s designed to solve a crucial problem: pricing the work of AI agents in a way that reflects their true value. After months of discussions with several startups using agentic platforms, Medina identified a significant challenge. Many of these companies simply didn’t know the best way to charge for their services because conventional per-user or per-seat pricing just doesn’t fit with how AI agents operate.

The traditional billing practices used in software, such as charging per seat (like older Microsoft Office models), fall short when one person can manage multiple AI agents, or when AI agents perform tasks independently. Instead of paying for every single task performed, customers prefer to invest in the overall results, much like hiring a full-time employee. This is especially important when the AI’s success is measured by end outcomes rather than individual actions.

A Novel Approach to Revenue and Margin Management

One of the biggest hurdles for companies offering AI services is accommodating the variable costs associated with operating these agents. The cost setup often depends on factors like the number of LLM tokens processed during training and execution. Paid steps in to balance these factors by offering both fixed and usage-based pricing models that help maintain profitable margins.

Moreover, the platform tracks the output of each AI agent. This feature not only helps companies understand the return on their investment but also allows them to experiment with different pricing strategies tailored to specific customers and industry needs.

Key Benefits of Paid:

Flexible pricing options that cater to the unique nature of AI agents.
Real-time monitoring of agent performance to validate ROI.
Support for businesses transitioning from traditional billing systems.

Read also: Firebase Studio Alternatives

Bridging HR Management and Modern Billing

Just as the worlds of HR management and billing have evolved with digital transformation, Paid offers a fresh approach that merges the precision of software billing with HR-like performance tracking. This combination enables startups to navigate the uncertainties of pricing AI-generated services, ensuring that each role—whether managed by a human or an AI agent—is evaluated based on its contributions.

For instance, if an AI agent is assigned an insurance role where success is measured by completed policy renewals, companies can avoid incremental charges for every minor task like sending an email. Instead, they can focus on the overall effectiveness of the role, ensuring they pay for real results.

Read also: OpenAI Optimus Alpha

A Vision Realized by an Industry Veteran

Manny Medina’s journey from founding Outreach—which grew from a small startup to a company with 800 employees and $250 million in annual recurring revenue—to launching Paid demonstrates his knack for solving modern business challenges. With Paid, he is not only addressing the pricing problems of AI agents but also setting a new standard for how startups can manage billing and performance in the era of automation.

The new venture has already attracted attention, securing a €10 million pre-seed investment from prominent firms such as EQT Ventures, Sequoia, and other influential partners. Currently based in London, Medina and his team are working diligently to refine a platform that is fast, adaptable, and ready for the future of AI-driven business processes.