The problem
Companies want capable AI agents they can self-host and control, without lock-in to one closed vendor
What they do
Open-source AI lab behind Hermes Agent, now selling Hermes for Businesses
Traction $36M ARR mid-Sep 2026, targeting $100M by year-end (WSJ); Hermes cloned 24M+ times; #50 on a16z Top 50 Consumer AI Apps by Monthly Revenue (Oct 2026)
Hiring trend
- Open roles
- 15
- Ops roles
- 2
- Headcount
- ~46
~46 staff (Caplight, Aug 2026); 14 open roles in NYC incl. enterprise and controller hires after Series B
Hiring in
- Americas
- New York
- Remote
Funding
- Last round
- $90M
- Stage
- Series B
- Date
- Oct 2026
Led by Robot Ventures
- Hiring+1.515 open roles on the live job board (10–29 roles = +1.5)
- Funding recency+1.5Series B · $90M, Oct 2026 (this month): 6 months or less = +1.5
- Traction+1.5Strong growth: $36M ARR mid-Sep 2026, targeting $100M by year-end (WSJ); Hermes cloned 24M+ times; #50 on a16z Top 50 Consumer AI Apps by Monthly Revenue (Oct 2026)
- Red flags−11 significant flag in the last 24 months, −1 eachHermes Agent security: a dozen-plus public CVEs in 2026 (command injection, sandbox escape, auth bypass), several with public exploits and reports that the vendor did not respond to disclosures.VYPR: Nine Hermes Agent CVEs disclosed in a single day (May 2026) ↗ · SentinelOne: CVE-2026-14626, no vendor response (Jul 2026) ↗ · GitHub Advisory: CVE-2026-9368 sandbox issue ↗
- Total3.51.5 + 1.5 + 1.5 − 1 = 3.5 → Tempo (3.5–4.24)
Distance (10K) is a separate read on how long the lead can last. It doesn't change the score.
Distance
10K · edge: grows with users
Hermes is a leading open-source agent with huge adoption, but the MIT license invites clones and OpenAI, Anthropic and Microsoft ship agents straight to the same enterprise buyers; enterprise tier is brand new.
Sources: TechCrunch: $90M Series B, 24M clones, $36M ARR (Oct 2026) ↗ · Object Edge: enterprise tier has no pricing or named customers yet (Oct 2026) ↗
Watch-outs
Hermes Agent security: a dozen-plus public CVEs in 2026 (command injection, sandbox escape, auth bypass), several with public exploits and reports that the vendor did not respond to disclosures.
Sources: VYPR: Nine Hermes Agent CVEs disclosed in a single day (May 2026) ↗ · SentinelOne: CVE-2026-14626, no vendor response (Jul 2026) ↗ · GitHub Advisory: CVE-2026-9368 sandbox issue ↗
Last checked Oct 25, 2026