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Glean

Category: Foundation Models / LLMs

An enterprise AI platform and middleware layer that enables organizations to search, discover, and build agentic AI workflows across all internal company data with strict security and permission awareness. Glean was founded in 2019. The company is led by Arvind Jain. Based in Palo Alto, USA. Team size: 1,000+. Total funding raised: $642.0M. Latest round: Series E. Key investors include ["Sequoia Capital","Kleiner Perkins","Lightspeed Venture Partners","General Catalyst","Altimeter Capital","DST Global","IVP","Iconiq Growth"].

Founded
2019
Headquarters
Palo Alto, USA
Team size
1,000+
Total funding
$642.0M

Value proposition

Provides a secure, 'permission-aware' central nervous system for enterprise knowledge, allowing employees to find information instantly and developers to deploy generative AI agents without compromising data security.

Products and solutions

["Glean Search: Unified enterprise-wide search across 100+ SaaS connectors.","Glean Chat: A secure, generative AI assistant for workplace queries.","Glean Runtime: A middleware layer for building and deploying custom enterprise AI apps and agents.","Glean Apps: Low-code tools for creating specialized AI assistants for specific departments (HR, Sales, Engineering).","Knowledge Management: Automated wiki-style pages and expert identification."]

Unique value

Unlike consumer LLMs, Glean utilizes a proprietary 'Enterprise Knowledge Graph' that understands the relationships between people, content, and activity while strictly enforcing existing document-level permissions in real-time.

Target customer

Large-scale enterprises, IT and engineering departments, and knowledge-intensive organizations (e.g., technology, financial services, healthcare).

Industries served

["Technology & Software","Financial Services","Healthcare & Life Sciences","Retail & E-commerce","Manufacturing","Professional Services"]

Technology advantage

The 'Glean Runtime' serves as an AI middleware layer, abstracting the complexity of RAG (Retrieval-Augmented Generation) and data indexing, allowing enterprises to pivot from simple search to complex agentic workflows with zero manual data mapping.

How they differentiate

Glean differentiates through its 'permission-aware' indexing, which ensures AI responses respect existing enterprise security protocols in real-time. Unlike generic LLMs, it uses a proprietary Enterprise Knowledge Graph to connect disparate SaaS data without requiring manual data mapping, now evolving into an 'AI Middleware' layer (Glean Runtime) for building custom agentic workflows.

Main competitors

["Coveo","Microsoft (Microsoft Search & Copilot)","Sinequa","Hebbia"]

Key partnerships

["Major Cloud Providers: AWS, Google Cloud, and Microsoft Azure.","SaaS Ecosystem: Deep integrations with Salesforce, Slack, Atlassian, and ServiceNow.","AI Infrastructure: Strategic alignment with NVIDIA for optimized enterprise AI performance."]

Notable customers

["Duolingo","Grammarly","Okta","Canva","Instacart","Bill.com"]

Major milestones

["Achieved 'Centaur' status by surpassing $100M ARR in February 2025.","Closed $260M Series E at a $4.6B valuation in September 2024.","Launched 'Glean Runtime' in late 2024, pivoting from search to an AI middleware provider.","Named to the CNBC Disruptor 50 list in 2024."]

Growth metrics

Surpassed $100M in Annual Recurring Revenue (ARR) as of February 2025, doubling its revenue in less than a year; currently valued at $4.6B.

Market positioning

Premium Enterprise AI and Search platform leader, positioned as the 'central nervous system' for corporate knowledge across the SaaS-heavy tech and finance sectors.

Geographic focus

Global, with primary market concentration in North America and expanding operations in Europe and Asia-Pacific.

Patents and IP

Proprietary technology focused on permission-aware indexing, enterprise-grade semantic search, and automated knowledge graph construction (specific public patent filings focus on cross-platform data retrieval).

About Arvind Jain

Arvind Jain is a seasoned engineering leader and entrepreneur with over 25 years of experience. Before founding Glean, he co-founded Rubrik (NYSE: RBRK), a cloud data management leader, where he served as VP of Engineering. Previously, he spent 11 years at Google as a Distinguished Engineer, where he was a founding member of the teams for Google Search, Maps, and YouTube infrastructure.

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