Latest news with #JoeScheidler
Miami Herald
3 days ago
- Business
- Miami Herald
Helios Secures $4M Seed Round to Build First AI-Native Operating System for Public Policy Professionals
Agentic AI platform built for government interaction gives policy and legal teams leverage to move faster, stay ahead of the compliance curve, and outmaneuver red tape. NEW YORK CITY, NY / ACCESS Newswire / July 11, 2025 / Helios, a technology company building the first AI-native operating system for public policy professionals, today announced that it has raised $4 million in seed funding led by Unusual Ventures, with participation from Founders Inc., Alumni Ventures and a select group of strategic angel investors. The company is gaining early traction in a U.S. market with $10B+ in annual software & lobbying spend. It is working to reshape how private entities and government agencies navigate policy and regulatory challenges, with billions already under management by early adopters. "Policy, compliance, and regulatory affairs professionals shouldn't be stuck playing defense - constantly reacting to changes they didn't see coming," said Joe Scheidler, CEO & Co-Founder. "We built Proxi to change that. In a world where one missed signal can cost millions or derail strategy, Proxi gives public policy and compliance intelligence teams the clarity, speed, and leverage to shape outcomes instead of getting blindsided by them." Proxi is the first AI-native OS purpose-built for public policy, regulatory affairs, legal, compliance, and government teams. It replaces the patchwork of tools these professionals rely on to navigate legislative change, manage public-private relationships, and respond to shifting regulatory demands. Whether in the private sector or across federal, state, and local governments - Proxi enables faster, more strategic decision-making in environments where the cost of delay or misalignment is measured in lost contract opportunities, failed policy, or reputational risk. The consequences aren't just regulatory-they're existential. The Proxi platform: (i) delivers instant answers and strategic recommendations based on live federal and subnational legislative and regulatory activity, (ii) drafts memos, filings, and policy documents with built-in editing and team collaboration, (iii) parses long-form bills, reports, and filings into structured insights and risk alerts, (iv) centralizes all relevant policy and regulatory data for team-wide access and historical context, and (v) tracks government relationships, meeting notes, and stakeholder engagement-all in a secure, AI-powered workspace. By integrating these core functions in a single secure system, Proxi replaces manual, fragmented processes with the speed, foresight, and precision modern institutions demand. Helios's founding team - Joe Scheidler (CEO), Joseph Farsakh (President), and Brandon Smith (CTO) - brings together experience from the White House, State Department, Microsoft, USAID, Datadog, and King & Spalding, bridging deep public sector insight with world-class technical execution. "We are excited to back the talented founding team at Helios as they leverage AI to reshape how policy professionals drive critical strategy and growth within their organizations," said Lars Albright, General Partner at Unusual Ventures. "As regulations continue to evolve rapidly and grow increasingly complex, modern tools that enable enterprises not only to stay informed, but also to respond swiftly and strategically, are more essential than ever." More than 100 public policy professionals, including Fortune 500 companies; federal, state, and local regulatory bodies; consultancies; and top lobbying firms have joined Helios' rapidly growing waitlist. The funding will accelerate product development, team expansion, and go-to-market efforts. To learn more, visit ABOUT HELIOS: Helios is building the first AI-native operating system for government interaction, empowering public policy, legal, and compliance professionals with end-to-end automation, secure AI agents, and precision tooling. Headquartered in New York City with a presence in Washington, D.C. and California, Helios is on a mission to modernize how institutions engage with government at every level. Learn more at MEDIA CONTACT: Nina Pfister, MAG PR at nina@ ### SOURCE: Helios
Yahoo
5 days ago
- Business
- Yahoo
Helios wants to be the AI operating system for public policy professionals
When OpenAI was having its ChatGPT moment in 2022, Joe Scheidler, co-founder and CEO of Helios, was tackling a different kind of challenge: Helping build the White House's newly authorized cybersecurity office and navigating the complexities of public-private coordination on cyber policies. His current co-founder, Joseph Farsakh, was also at the State Department, working on Yemen Houthi peace negotiations. The two overlapped in national security discussions and started trading notes on how large language models might transform public policy on a day-to-day level. On the level the White House operates, critical decisions are often made using a patchwork of tools, spreadsheets, and institutional memory. The founders thought: What if there was a better way to support decision making, one that combined AI-native tools with an understanding of how public policy is decided? The answer to that question was the idea behind Helios. To make it real, the co-founders brought on Brandon Smith, a long-time acquaintance of Scheidler's and a machine learning veteran who had worked at Microsoft and Datadog, to lead the technical vision. 'Our unfair advantage is bringing a super unique blend of domain expertise, contacts, and technical expertise to a really important problem,' Scheidler told TechCrunch. Helios (not to be confused with the payroll/HR management solution, or the climate/economic forecasting product of the same name) emerged from stealth last month with $4 million in seed funding. The round was led by Unusual Ventures, with participation from Founders Inc. and Alumni Ventures, TechCrunch has exclusively learned. Helios' flagship product is Proxi, an AI-based operating system built for public policy, regulatory affairs, legal, compliance, and government teams, is still in beta. But, Scheidler says, the company is already seeing early traction with workers in federal, state, and local agencies, as well as Fortune 500 companies and startups. 'We wanted to empower all public policy, legal and compliance professionals with end-to-end automation, deploying sort of a web of secure AI agents that are trained and fine-tuned against really robust public policy data sets to support them on anything from strategic advisement to very sensitive and complex writing products, data analysis and stakeholder mapping,' he said. Proxi has four core features. The first is dubbed 'Consult,' and Scheidler describes it as a 'conversational AI agent, your 24/7, always-on public policy team member who is constantly scanning the legislative and regulatory environment.' Before they begin, customers tell Proxi about themselves, their work, their portfolio, their focus and objectives. The agents then surface key information to the user every time they log on. In a way, Consult is similar to another software platform by Hence, which uses AI to help organizations monitor geopolitical and business risk. Proxi's second feature is called 'Scribe.' This is a collaborative AI editing and writing tool that helps policy professionals turn their soundboarding sessions with Consult into memos, filings and policy documents. Then there's 'Decipher,' a large-scale data analysis tool that helps users parse long-form bills, reports and filings, and turn them into structured insights and risk alerts. 'That's a lot of what I spent my time doing at the State Department when I would have far preferred to just be on the Hill, building relationships with people who are actually making draft amendments and provisions,' Scheidler said. Finally, Proxi offers a CRM (customer relationship management) tool that helps people visually map out their stakeholder environment and track their interaction history, including meeting notes. It's an all-in-one offering, Scheidler said, noting that Helios uses top encryption standards for federal clients, and is currently working through compliance audits. Helios plans to use the seed funding to flesh out its product and engineering team, with a focus on finding the right tech talent. Rather than rushing to monetize quickly, Scheidler says the startup is focusing on building long-term business relationships and collecting meticulous feedback from early beta users. 'Our goal in five to seven years from now is for Helios to be completely synonymous with all government public and private interaction,' he added. That may mean barrelling past short-term competition like Bloomberg Government and Fiscal Note Forum to challenge longer-term rivals like Palantir, OpenGov and Civica, the co-founder said. 'Palantir just surpassed a $300 billion market cap,' Scheidler said. 'We think there's a lot of room to play in this space over time.'
TechCrunch
5 days ago
- Business
- TechCrunch
Helios wants to be the AI operating system for public policy professionals
When OpenAI was having its ChatGPT moment in 2022, Joe Scheidler, co-founder and CEO of Helios, was tackling a different kind of challenge: Helping build the White House's newly authorized cybersecurity office and navigating the complexities of public-private coordination on cyber policies. His current co-founder, Joseph Farsakh, was also at the State Department, working on Yemen Houthi peace negotiations. The two overlapped in national security discussions and started trading notes on how large language models might transform public policy on a day-to-day level. On the level the White House operates, critical decisions are often made using a patchwork of tools, spreadsheets, and institutional memory. The founders thought: What if there was a better way to support decision making, one that combined AI-native tools with an understanding of how public policy is decided? The answer to that question was the idea behind Helios. To make it real, the co-founders brought on Brandon Smith, a long-time acquaintance of Scheidler's and a machine learning veteran who had worked at Microsoft and Datadog, to lead the technical vision. 'Our unfair advantage is bringing a super unique blend of domain expertise, contacts, and technical expertise to a really important problem,' Scheidler told TechCrunch. Helios (not to be confused with the payroll/HR management solution, or the climate/economic forecasting product of the same name) emerged from stealth last month with $4 million in seed funding. The round was led by Unusual Ventures, with participation from Founders Inc. and Alumni Ventures, TechCrunch has exclusively learned. Founders of Helios. (Right to Left) Joseph Faraskh (president), Joe Scheidler (CEO), Brandom Smith (CTO) Image Credits:Helios Helios' flagship product is Proxi, an AI-based operating system built for public policy, regulatory affairs, legal, compliance, and government teams, is still in beta. But, Scheidler says, the company is already seeing early traction with workers in federal, state, and local agencies, as well as Fortune 500 companies and startups. Techcrunch event Save up to $475 on your TechCrunch All Stage pass Build smarter. Scale faster. Connect deeper. Join visionaries from Precursor Ventures, NEA, Index Ventures, Underscore VC, and beyond for a day packed with strategies, workshops, and meaningful connections. Save $450 on your TechCrunch All Stage pass Build smarter. Scale faster. Connect deeper. Join visionaries from Precursor Ventures, NEA, Index Ventures, Underscore VC, and beyond for a day packed with strategies, workshops, and meaningful connections. Boston, MA | REGISTER NOW 'We wanted to empower all public policy, legal and compliance professionals with end-to-end automation, deploying sort of a web of secure AI agents that are trained and fine-tuned against really robust public policy data sets to support them on anything from strategic advisement to very sensitive and complex writing products, data analysis and stakeholder mapping,' he said. Proxi has four core features. The first is dubbed 'Consult,' and Scheidler describes it as a 'conversational AI agent, your 24/7, always-on public policy team member who is constantly scanning the legislative and regulatory environment.' Before they begin, customers tell Proxi about themselves, their work, their portfolio, their focus and objectives. The agents then surface key information to the user every time they log on. In a way, Consult is similar to another software platform by Hence, which uses AI to help organizations monitor geopolitical and business risk. Proxi's second feature is called 'Scribe.' This is a collaborative AI editing and writing tool that helps policy professionals turn their soundboarding sessions with Consult into memos, filings and policy documents. Then there's 'Decipher,' a large-scale data analysis tool that helps users parse long-form bills, reports and filings, and turn them into structured insights and risk alerts. 'That's a lot of what I spent my time doing at the State Department when I would have far preferred to just be on the Hill, building relationships with people who are actually making draft amendments and provisions,' Scheidler said. Finally, Proxi offers a CRM (customer relationship management) tool that helps people visually map out their stakeholder environment and track their interaction history, including meeting notes. It's an all-in-one offering, Scheidler said, noting that Helios uses top encryption standards for federal clients, and is currently working through compliance audits. Helios plans to use the seed funding to flesh out its product and engineering team, with a focus on finding the right tech talent. Rather than rushing to monetize quickly, Scheidler says the startup is focusing on building long-term business relationships and collecting meticulous feedback from early beta users. 'Our goal in five to seven years from now is for Helios to be completely synonymous with all government public and private interaction,' he added. That may mean barrelling past short-term competition like Bloomberg Government and Fiscal Note Forum to challenge longer-term rivals like Palantir, OpenGov and Civica, the co-founder said. 'Palantir just surpassed a $300 billion market cap,' Scheidler said. 'We think there's a lot of room to play in this space over time.'
