Building business software since 2014.
Now the AI operating system for business.
Started in 2014 with SKULLY and open-source commerce, through Techstars ’17, Zoo Labs Foundation in 2021, to 1600+ open repositories and the sovereign AI cloud today. Led by CEO Antje Worring and CTO Zach Kelling.
Track record
Twelve years of shipping for venture-funded companies
Building business software since 2014, with AI and machine learning in commercial use from the start and GPT models in production by 2019. Founded as Crowdstart and renamed Hanzo in 2016. The first customer, SKULLY, raised $1M in about 45 hours, the fastest fully funded campaign on Indiegogo.
The first blockchain-native commerce platform, 2017: the Unikrn ICO raised over 120,000 ETH.
Damon Motorcycles and Triller, two of the companies Hanzo built with, listed on Nasdaq in 2024.
Hundreds of venture-funded startups, backed by Y Combinator, 500 Startups, Techstars and other tier-1 firms: billions in client revenue, and two companies taken past 100 million users.
Selected for Techstars in 2017 to build intelligent commerce: analytics, marketing and commerce on one learning engine.
Twelve years of engineering
Built and invested in over 100 startups, generating over $1B in revenue, 9 unicorns, and 2 IPO exits. From our first customer SKULLY in 2014 to the sovereign AI cloud today.
2014
$5.8M Raised · Indiegogo #1SKULLY & Open-Source Commerce
Hanzo was founded in 2014. First customer: SKULLY, pioneering the world’s first AI and augmented reality heads-up display motorcycle helmet.
Raised $2.5M on Indiegogo and $3.3M directly on Hanzo, reaching tens of millions of people worldwide with embedded spatial computer vision and real-time telematics.
Open-sourced hanzoai/commerce as one of our earliest public repositories, establishing our decade-long commitment to open infrastructure.
Launch · 2014$5.8M Raised · #1 CampaignSKULLY AR Helmet
Spatial computing, heads-up display telemetry, and computer vision interface reaching tens of millions.
2015
250k Signups · Health WearablesBellabeat AI Wearables for Women
Partnered with Bellabeat to architect their women’s health AI wearable platform and data infrastructure.
Collected 250,000 email signups and tens of thousands of pre-orders at launch, establishing their wearable platform and data infrastructure.
Launch · 2015250k Signups · Health PlatformBellabeat Health Platform
AI-driven biometric tracking and personalized wellness wearables scaled to millions of connected devices.
2016
Zero Press · $1.5M/MoKANOA Smart Audio & Earbuds
Launched KANOA, pioneering early true wireless smart earbuds.
Launched without press coverage, relying exclusively on Hanzo’s data + AI engine to collect 50,000 pre-orders and scale smoothly from zero to $1.5M/month month-over-month ($10M+ total).
Launch · 2016$1.5M/Mo · $10M+ SalesKANOA Wireless Audio
Early true wireless earbuds powered entirely by Hanzo data & autonomous audience segmentation.
2017
120k ETH · Regulated ICOUnikrn 120,000 ETH ICO & Techstars
Engineered the token launch for Unikrn (Unikoin Gold), the first regulated esports bookmaker, raising over 120,000 ETH from the public across 15+ jurisdictions before its acquisition by Entain.
Selected for Techstars ’17 (Boulder/NYC), architecting distributed infrastructure for smart contract auditing and cryptographic settlement.
Consensus · 2017120k ETH Raised · AcquiredUnikrn (Unikoin Gold)
Regulated Ethereum token economy with multi-jurisdiction compliance and automated verification.
2018
SEC Approved · $650M ATHArca SEC Stablecoin & Casper Network
Arca: Launched the first SEC-approved interest-bearing stablecoin, scaling institutional assets under management to $500M+ by 2021.
Casper Labs: Co-designed architecture, led the Rust pivot, and launched the network as founding members of DEVxDAO (early Swiss DAO). CSPR reached an all-time-high market cap of $650M.
Institutional Web3 · 2018$500M+ AUM · $650M ATHArca Stablecoin & Casper Blockchain
First SEC-regulated interest-bearing digital asset ($500M+ AUM) and enterprise proof-of-stake blockchain.
2019
CES Best of Innovation · IPODamon Electric Hypersport & CoPilot Radar
Engineered the digital platform and edge telematics for Damon Motorcycles, generating $8.4M in sales in month one and exceeding $100M+ in total sales leading to IPO.
Powered the sub-50ms CoPilot 360° radar collision warning system, winning CES Best of Innovation in 2020 and 2022.
EV & Edge AI · 2019$100M+ Sales · IPODamon Motorcycles
Sub-50ms radar edge telematics and 500x ROI launch campaign for next-gen electric superbikes.
2020
169M+ Viewers · 82M MAUTrillerFest & Planetary Scale Streaming
Architected low-latency global ingress for Triller, delivering TrillerFest to over 169M live viewers worldwide.
Scaled platform infrastructure as monthly active users grew past 82M, powering creator distribution toward public listing (IPO).
Global Media · 2020169M+ Viewers · 82M MAUTriller & TrillerFest
Largest virtual streaming event in history with high-concurrency real-time audience distribution.
2021
$2.7B+ ATH Market CapZoo Labs Foundation & Decentralized AI
Founded Zoo Labs Foundation as a 501(c)(3) nonprofit research institution dedicated to decentralized AI research and open foundation models.
Completed a $5M+ token sale for early AI blockchain compute, with ZOO market cap reaching an all-time high of $2.7B+. Built the Gym distributed training platform and DSO protocol ($18 per model adaptation).
Decentralized AI · 2021$2.7B+ ATH Market CapZoo Labs Foundation
501(c)(3) non-profit AI research network, Gym training cluster, and community ZIPs governance.
2022
$2.4B+ ATH Market CapLUX Post-Quantum Consensus Network
Engineered LUX Network, a high-speed post-quantum blockchain architecture with sub-second finality.
Raised $10M+ in token sale, reaching an all-time-high market cap of $2.4B+, establishing foundational cryptographic primitives used across Hanzo KMS.
Post-Quantum · 2022$2.4B+ ATH Market CapLUX Network
Quantum-resistant consensus and high-throughput transaction pipelines.
2023
3.4× Lift · AI PersonalizationPredictive Commerce & Autonomous Merchandising
Scaled predictive AI commerce with Karma Fashion, generating a 3.4× campaign growth lift and automated neural personalization for direct-to-consumer retail.
Integrated real-time semantic discovery and autonomous merchandising workflows across next-generation commerce brands.
Commerce AI · 20233.4× Growth LiftKarma Fashion
AI-driven crowdfunding and dynamic neural personalization that catalyzed retail growth.
2024
12M Items / Day · 400% EngagementMultimodal Social Discovery & Real-Time AI Moderation
Deployed Zen multimodal vision and text models to process 12M daily content items for Keek with sub-second latency.
Adapted the EARLE recommendation architecture for large-scale social discovery, driving a 400% increase in content engagement and 85% reduction in harmful content reach.
Multimodal AI · 202412M Items / DayKeek Social Platform
Multimodal content understanding and real-time safety pipeline processing 12M items daily.
2025
13 HIP-0300 Tools · 260+ ToolsThe Agent Protocol (MCP) & Computer Control
Pioneered the Model Context Protocol (MCP) ecosystem, standardizing 260+ tools across 13 HIP-0300 unified primitives with automatic ZAP service bridging.
Released Operative for multimodal computer use, Hanzo Dev for autonomous terminal coding, and the cross-platform Hanzo Desktop app.
Protocol Milestone · 2025260+ ToolsHanzo MCP & Operative
Native agent protocol exposing every cloud subsystem as an executable tool with browser and OS control.
2026
Zen 4 – Zen 7 · Sovereign StackThe Sovereign AI Cloud & Frontier Zen Family
Released the frontier Zen model family: Zen 4 in February, Zen 5 in May, Zen 6 and Zen 6 Flash in September, with Zen 7 research preview underway.
Introduced original reasoning architectures Enso and Kai multimodal intelligence, powered by the C/CUDA/Metal Hanzo Engine, distributed Hanzo Base, and sovereign Hanzo KMS key custody on api.hanzo.ai.
Sovereign Cloud · 2026131k ContextZen, Enso & Sovereign Stack
Full sovereign AI cloud: low-level C/CUDA/Metal engine, private KMS custody, and frontier foundation models.
The Zen of Hanzo
The principles the company argues from when a decision is close.
Enable the Underdog
Enable others to win. Democratize technology so small businesses and startups can compete with industry giants.
Data-Driven Everything
Let data be your guide. Embrace analytics and AI as the foundation of decision-making.
Open Innovation
Be open, share often. Openness accelerates growth—both for the company and its community.
Adaptability
Pivot with purpose. There is no failure, only feedback. Move quickly and strike in new directions when opportunity calls.
Customer-Centric Growth
Coach clients like a sensei. Treat each client as a long-term partner and guide them to success.
First Principles Thinking
See the invisible, do the impossible. Boil problems down to their essence and solve them in fundamentally better ways.
The Sensei Method
The Zen of Hanzo is what we believe. The Sensei Method is what an engagement looks like — Sensei Group sits with your team and works the problem alongside them.
Identify First-Principle Goals
Drill down to the fundamental objectives that drive real value.
Rapid Prototyping
Build quickly, test assumptions, and iterate with purpose.
Data-Driven Decisions
Measure impact, analyze patterns, and let insights guide strategy.
Sensei Mentorship
Work directly with expert “senseis” to implement and refine your approach.
The Impact of Sensei
Through the Sensei Method and Hanzo engineering, our team has built and invested in over 100 startups, generating over $1B in revenue, 9 unicorns, and 2 IPO exits.
Revenue Generated
Startups Built
Unicorns
IPO Exits
Hanzo AI is led by CEO Antje Worring (GitHub) and CTO Zach Kelling (GitHub). Company information, governance, and investor contact are on the investor page.
Hanzo voice speech recognition uses NVIDIA Parakeet TDT 0.6B v3 (https://huggingface.co/nvidia/parakeet-tdt-0.6b-v3) by NVIDIA, licensed under CC BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). The model was converted to ONNX and quantized to 8-bit integers by the k2-fsa sherpa-onnx project.