The challenge facing research agencies today is simple but crippling: limited bandwidth. When a pharmaceutical company wants to test whether doctors prefer pills or sachets, an agency might spend days manually coding surveys, coordinating with a half-dozen panel providers, and writing validation scripts. These are skilled tasks, but they’re largely repetitive and time-consuming.
Metaforms steps in here, not to replace human researchers, but to help them do more. The startup’s AI agents integrate into existing systems and handle the busywork: converting questionnaires into survey code, flagging errors in incoming data, coordinating panel vendors, and tracking quotas across multi-country studies. It’s a force multiplier that helps agencies take on more work while protecting their teams from burnout.
$9M Series A to expand agent capabilities
In a recent development, Metaforms has snapped up a $9 million Series A funding round led by Peak XV Partners (formerly Sequoia India). The round also saw continued support from existing investors Nexus Venture Partners and Together Fund. With this new capital, Metaforms’ total funding now exceeds $10 million.
The funding will fuel the company’s plans to scale its platform, grow its team, and expand into adjacent workflows such as automated report generation and voice-based research. Metaforms will also deepen integrations with popular tools used in the research industry, including Decipher, SPSS, and Confirmit.
Looking ahead, the company plans to triple its team and scale its agent capabilities even further. Long-term, the goal is to process over 100,000 surveys per year and make professional-grade research accessible to every business that needs it.
A platform built by founders who felt the pain
Metaforms was founded by Akshat Tyagi and Arjun S in 2022. The founders experienced the research bottleneck first-hand as early-stage startup founders. When they tried to access professional-grade insights for their own business ideas, they found agencies didn’t have the bandwidth to serve them. The issue wasn’t demand but was operational overload. This frustration sparked the idea for Metaforms: a platform that allows agencies to take on more projects without more strain.
Since its commercial launch just six months ago, Metaforms has already partnered with four of the world’s top twenty research agencies, including Strat7, one of the largest globally. The platform is now processing over 1,000 surveys per month, serving both startups and Fortune 500 companies.
Beyond improving operations, Metaforms is changing who gets access to high-quality insights. By reducing turnaround times and cutting operational costs, the platform allows agencies to take on clients they might otherwise turn away. This includes early-stage startups looking to test their first ideas and multinational brands running large-scale trackers.
100% expansion rate among customers
Adoption has been rapid and sticky. Every customer who began using a single AI agent has since expanded their use of the platform, resulting in a 100% expansion rate. That level of satisfaction speaks to the real-world impact Metaforms is delivering shorter timelines, lower costs, and new opportunities for agencies to grow their businesses without sacrificing quality.
The platform’s intelligent agents are currently deployed in areas like survey programming, data processing, and bidding management, with voice research on the horizon. Each agent is designed not just to automate tasks, but to work seamlessly within the research team’s existing environment, enhancing rather than replacing human judgment.
Built for agencies, not against them
Metaforms isn’t out to replace researchers or disrupt the agency model. Instead, it offers a smarter, more scalable way to work within it. In an industry worth $130 billion globally, that kind of practical innovation is badly needed.
By blending automation with deep respect for the craft of research, Metaforms is helping agencies win more business, maintain quality, and stay ahead of rising expectations. With fresh funding in hand and growing demand, the company is well on its way to becoming an essential tool in the future of insight work.
“We’re thrilled to partner with Akshat and Arjun as they reimagine what a market research agency could look like in an AI-first world. Metaforms is scaling rapidly, by enabling some of the largest research agencies globally to automate workflows such as survey programming and data processing through their suite of AI agents,” said Shailendra Singh, MD, Peak XV.
Metaforms has been incredibly successful thanks to their uniquely thoughtful approach to modernising research operations, embedding seamlessly into the workflows, tools, and platforms that researchers and agencies already use. I’m excited to continue supporting the team as they build on that momentum with this Series A,” added Jonathan Tice, GTM Consultant [Prev: Chief Customer Officer, Forsta].
“Our goal is simple: help great research teams spend less time firefighting and more time doing the work that actually matters,” said Akshat Tyagi, co-founder and CEO of Metaforms. “When you automate the grunt work, you make high-quality research more accessible to more companies.”
“Metaforms is a breakout example of the India-to-global play in AI,” said Manav Garg, Co-founder and managing partner at Together Fund. “They’re not just automating tasks — they’re rebuilding research infrastructure for the modern era. With their early traction across global agencies, Akshat and Arjun are showing what’s possible when deep customer empathy meets technical ambition.”
“Our partnership has delivered strong ROl, thanks to Metaforms’ exceptional service and prompt support,” added Tabita Razaila, Head of operations, Strat7.
“They’re solving a major pain point for the entire industry. That focus and ability to deeply understand customer needs and address them using genetic AI is the hallmark of Metaforms team. We are thrilled to back Akshat and Arjun in their journey of building a remarkable company!” said Jishnu Bhattacharjee and Arjun Gandhi, Nexus Venture Partners.
