Genius AI raises $44 million at $1.15 billion valuation

Genius AI, formerly known as GlossGenius, has raised $44 million in Series D funding at a $1.15 billion valuation, with Lux Capital leading the round. The company is using the financing and a rebrand to push beyond beauty and wellness software into a broader AI platform for in-person service businesses, a category it says includes millions of operators that still spend large portions of the week on administration.

Bessemer Venture Partners, Imaginary Ventures, L Catterton Growth, 2048 Ventures, StepStone Private Ventures and existing backers also participated, according to the company. Genius AI said it has now raised more than $125 million since launching in 2016. The company did not disclose headcount.

From vertical SaaS to AI platform

Genius AI was founded by identical twin sisters Danielle and Leah Cohen-Shohet, both Princeton graduates and former Goldman Sachs analysts. Danielle Cohen-Shohet, now CEO, began working on the problem while operating a freelance makeup business and, according to the company, taught herself full-stack engineering before building the first version of GlossGenius.

The original product served beauty and wellness businesses with software for scheduling, payments, marketing, staffing and client management. Genius AI says more than 125,000 businesses now use the platform across half of all U.S. ZIP codes. It also claims its products have saved customers 112 million hours of administrative work, supported $2 billion in additional revenue and handled more than 624 million client touchpoints.

The company says it is approaching a $200 million annual revenue run rate. That is the most concrete operating metric disclosed in the announcement, and gives the new valuation a clearer revenue base than many AI-branded software financings. Profitability, retention and customer concentration were not disclosed.

The AI claim

The rebrand from GlossGenius to Genius AI is meant to signal a wider product ambition. The company says it wants to build AI agents that can complete multi-step business tasks for service providers rather than only giving them software tools to move faster. It has framed the opportunity around in-person businesses that handle booking, payments, customer communication and staffing with limited back-office support.

Genius AI estimates that roughly 8 million in-person service businesses generate more than $2 trillion in annual spending globally. The company argues that AI investment has been concentrated on developers and knowledge workers, while physical service businesses remain less digitized. The announcement did not provide a timeline for the broader AI-agent roadmap or break out revenue from AI products.

Danielle Cohen-Shohet said the company believes technology in the sector can give service professionals more time for client work rather than reducing human craft to automation.

Why Lux is notable

Lux Capital’s role is a notable part of the financing. The firm recently closed a $1.5 billion ninth fund, its largest, and is associated with investments in deep tech, defense and frontier science companies including Anduril and Recursion Pharmaceuticals. Leading a growth round for a vertical software company serving salons, spas and adjacent service businesses suggests Lux sees the category as a place where AI agents may have practical commercial demand.

Bessemer’s continued participation adds another signal, since the firm has backed Genius AI across multiple rounds. For Genius AI, the next test is whether its AI positioning expands the market beyond its original beauty and wellness base while preserving the operating metrics that supported the unicorn valuation.

This story draws on original reporting from TechFundingNews.