Last Updated: February 2026
We compete (or coexist) across three layers. Understanding which companies live where — and where they’re heading — is critical.
LAYER 3: AGENTIC DISCOVERY (Our Primary Play)
Agent skill registries, agent commerce infra, skill governance
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LAYER 2: GEO / AEO / LLMO (Adjacent - Potential Competitors)
AI search visibility, brand monitoring, citation tracking
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LAYER 1: TRADITIONAL SEO (Legacy - Potential Acquirers/Partners)
Keyword rankings, backlinks, SERP tracking, content optimization
These are the established players with revenue, distribution, and enterprise relationships. The question is: will they move up to Layer 3?
Attribute Details Revenue $455M ARR (Q3 2025), $112M quarterly Market Cap ~$5B (pre-Adobe acquisition at $12/share) Status Being acquired by Adobe AI Pivot ”Semrush One” — combines SEO + AEO; AI Toolkit ($99/mo add-on) tracking ChatGPT, Gemini, Perplexity AI Revenue $10M ARR from AI products (Q3 2025), doubling quarter-over-quarter Threat to Us MEDIUM — focused on marketing teams, not developer/agent ecosystem. Adobe acquisition may slow innovation. Partnership Potential HIGH — could integrate our scanning/trust data into their platform
Attribute Details Revenue $149M (2024 full year) AI Pivot GEO feature added ($199/mo add-on); AI Content Helper; Yep.com (own search engine) Focus SEO + content marketing tools Threat to Us LOW — deeply SEO-focused; no agent or developer ecosystem play Partnership Potential MEDIUM — could integrate our agent visibility data
Attribute Details Revenue ~$60-70M estimated AI Pivot Minimal; focused on traditional SEO metrics Threat to Us LOW — declining relevance in AI era Partnership Potential LOW
Attribute Details Revenue ~$210M estimated (incl. Searchmetrics acquisition) Funding $150M+ from Bregal Sagemount AI Pivot Launched “Conductor AI” for AI search visibility; first enterprise SEO to go AI-native Focus Enterprise SEO + content intelligence Threat to Us MEDIUM — enterprise relationships and budget. Could expand into agent governance. Partnership Potential HIGH — enterprise SEO teams are our buyer
Attribute Details Revenue $90.8M Funding $64M+ Focus Enterprise SEO platform Threat to Us LOW-MEDIUM — enterprise focused but slow to move to agents Partnership Potential MEDIUM
Attribute Details Focus Enterprise SEO intelligence Threat to Us LOW — niche, enterprise-only
Company Revenue AI Pivot? Threat Key Takeaway Semrush $455M ARR Yes (AI Toolkit) MEDIUM Being acquired; AI product growing fast Ahrefs $149M Partial (GEO add-on) LOW SEO-first DNA, slow to agent layer Moz ~$65M Minimal LOW Declining Conductor ~$210M Yes (Conductor AI) MEDIUM Enterprise moat, AI-native pivot BrightEdge $91M Partial LOW-MEDIUM Enterprise, slow
Assessment: Legacy SEO companies are pivoting to Layer 2 (GEO/AEO). None are thinking about Layer 3 (agentic discovery). Their biggest threat is as potential acquirers if we succeed — or as distribution partners for our data.
These are the most direct competitive overlap. They’re already selling “get found by AI.” The question is: will they evolve from tracking mentions to powering agent decisions?
Attribute Details Funding $35M Series B (Sequoia) — total: $55M+ Focus AI visibility measurement and optimization Features Multi-country, multi-language AI visibility; Conversation Explorer for share-of-voice; GA4 attribution; SOC2 compliant Pricing $99/mo (Starter), $399/mo (Growth), Custom (Enterprise) Clients Fortune 500 companies Threat to Us HIGH — well-funded, enterprise relationships, could expand to agent skills Gap Tracks brand mentions in AI answers; does NOT address skill registries, agent commerce, or skill security
Attribute Details Funding $15M Series A (Decibel) Focus Monitor + fix how AI describes your brand Features Agent Experience Platform (AXP); SOC2 Type II; SSO; multi-LLM tracking Pricing $100/mo (Explorer), $500/mo (Growth), Custom (Enterprise) Traction 500+ brands, 50%+ MoM growth Clients Lenovo, BairesDev, Crunchbase Threat to Us MEDIUM-HIGH — fast-growing, enterprise-ready, “Agent Experience” positioning is close to ours Gap Brand monitoring focused; no skill marketplace, no developer tools, no security scanning
Attribute Details Funding $15M Series A (Felicis) Focus Competitive benchmarking across AI engines Clients Canada Goose, Miro, WPP Media Threat to Us MEDIUM — good VC backing, but narrow focus on brand benchmarking Gap No developer ecosystem, no skill marketplace
Attribute Details Funding $29M total raised Focus Real-time AI visibility, multi-language Features Coverage of ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini, Claude, AI Mode; near real-time tracking Pricing €89-€499/mo Threat to Us MEDIUM — strong product but focused on brand monitoring layer Gap No agent skills, no developer tools
Attribute Details Funding Bootstrapped Revenue $770K Traction 15,000+ users, 5,000+ paying Focus GEO auditing and brand mention tracking Pricing From $29/mo Threat to Us LOW-MEDIUM — scrappy but small; integrated into Semrush App Center Gap Tool-level product, not platform. No agent/skill focus.
Attribute Details Focus AI search optimization for ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini Features Track appearance in AI answers; suggest content/GEO actions Threat to Us LOW — feature-level, not platform-level
Attribute Details Focus AI visibility framework Threat to Us LOW — consulting-oriented
Attribute Details What Free AEO Grader tool Revenue $2.6B+ (HubSpot overall) Threat to Us LOW for now — free tool, marketing play. But HubSpot has massive distribution. Watch For If HubSpot makes AEO a core product feature, it changes the game for marketing teams
Company Funding Revenue/Traction Threat Why/Why Not Profound $55M+ Fortune 500 clients HIGH Best funded, Sequoia backing, enterprise Scrunch AI $15M 500+ brands, 50% MoM growth MEDIUM-HIGH Fast growth, “Agent Experience” positioning Peec AI $29M Strong Europe presence MEDIUM Good product, but brand-monitoring focus Evertune $15M WPP, Miro MEDIUM Narrow focus Otterly AI $0 15K+ users, $770K rev LOW-MEDIUM Scrappy, but small AIclicks — — LOW Feature, not platform HubSpot Public $2.6B+ LOW (for now) Free tool; watching
Total GEO/AEO funding: $200M+
Assessment: These companies are Layer 2. They track how AI mentions brands. We’re Layer 3 — we power how agents discover and act on skills/products. The overlap is in “AI visibility,” but our core product (skill registries, security scanning, developer monetization, enterprise governance) is different enough that we’re not directly competing on features. The risk is if Profound or Scrunch expand upward into agent skills.
Attribute Details What Official OpenClaw skill registry Skills 5,700+ Daily Installs 15,000+ Monetization None Security VirusTotal scanning (added post-incident) Threat HIGH — owns the OpenClaw relationship Gap Single-platform, no monetization, no enterprise, reactive security
Attribute Details What Cross-platform skills aggregator Skills 270,000+ Approach Aggregates from GitHub automatically Monetization None Security None Threat MEDIUM — scale, but no moat Gap Aggregation only, no curation/trust/payments/enterprise
Attribute Details What Marketplace for monetizing OpenClaw agents Payments USDT (TRC20) escrow, 0.5% fee Threat LOW — crypto-only, niche Gap No fiat, no security, no enterprise
Attribute Details What MCP server registry Servers 2,500+ Approach ”Docker Hub for MCP” Threat MEDIUM — adjacent (MCP, not SKILL.md), could expand Gap MCP-only, no security, no monetization, not enterprise-grade
Attribute Details What Managed MCP integration platform Integrations 500+ Approach Enterprise-grade managed infrastructure Threat MEDIUM — enterprise positioning, could add skills Gap Integration platform, not marketplace/discovery
Attribute Details What ”The Authority on AI Agent Optimization” — domain squatted Aug 2025 Status Content site, not a product (as of Feb 2026) Threat LOW — no product, just a domain play Note Shows others see the category; domain is taken
Company What They Could Build Threat Level Timeline Anthropic Native Claude Code skill marketplace HIGH 6-12 months OpenAI Codex skill store (has GPT Store precedent) HIGH 6-12 months Google Gemini CLI skill marketplace MEDIUM 12-18 months Microsoft VS Code / GitHub Copilot skill store HIGH 12-18 months Adobe Post-Semrush acquisition, could build agent visibility LOW-MEDIUM 18-24 months
(Track/Monitor) (Power Decisions)
┌────────────────────────┬────────────────────────┐
ENTERPRISE │ Profound ($55M) │ │
(Fortune 500) │ Scrunch AI ($15M) │ ★ OUR OPPORTUNITY ★ │
│ Conductor ($210M) │ Enterprise governance│
│ Peec AI ($29M) │ + agent-powered │
├────────────────────────┼────────────────────────┤
MID-MARKET │ Semrush AI Toolkit │ │
(Growth co's) │ Ahrefs GEO │ ★ OUR OPPORTUNITY ★ │
│ Evertune ($15M) │ SaaS vendor skill │
│ HubSpot AEO Grader │ optimization │
├────────────────────────┼────────────────────────┤
DEVELOPER / │ Otterly AI │ ClawHub (5.7K skills)│
SMB │ AIclicks │ SkillsMP (270K) │
│ │ ★ OUR ENTRY POINT ★ │
│ │ Security + discovery │
└────────────────────────┴────────────────────────┘
Key insight: The entire left column (PASSIVE) is about monitoring. The right column (ACTIVE) is about powering outcomes. Almost all funded companies are in the left column. The right column is wide open.
Competitor Their Moat How We Counter Semrush $455M revenue, 100K+ customers, brand recognition We’re a different layer; they’re a partner, not competitor Profound $55M funding, Sequoia, Fortune 500 clients We start with developers (bottom-up), not enterprises (top-down) ClawHub Official OpenClaw status, 15K daily installs We’re cross-platform; they’re locked to OpenClaw SkillsMP 270K skills indexed We add trust + monetization on top of scale
Our Moat Why It’s Hard to Copy Security scanning database Proprietary dataset of scan results across 370K+ skills — grows with every scan Cross-platform trust scores Requires partnerships and integrations with ALL registries Developer payment infrastructure Stripe Connect, licensing, payouts — complex to build and maintain Enterprise governance SSO, SCIM, audit logs, compliance — takes 12+ months to build properly MCP server (in-agent discovery) First-mover in being the discovery layer inside agents themselves Network effects More developers → more skills → more consumers → more developers
If we succeed, likely acquirers:
Acquirer Why Estimated Value Timeline Adobe/Semrush Complete the SEO→GEO→Agent stack $100-500M Year 3-5 Anthropic Own the Claude skills ecosystem $200M-1B Year 2-4 Microsoft/GitHub Copilot + VS Code skill governance $300M-1B Year 3-5 Snyk Expand security from packages to skills $100-300M Year 2-4 Stripe Own agent commerce infrastructure $200-500M Year 3-5
Source URL Search Engine Land — SEO/GEO/ASO naming searchengineland.com WEF — Agentic Engine Optimization weforum.org CB Insights — GEO companies cbinsights.com PlatelunchCollective — 24 AEO/GEO tools compared platelunchcollective.com Search Engine Journal — Can GEO startups beat SEO incumbents? searchenginejournal.com Semrush financials trefis.com VirusTotal — Agent skills security blog.virustotal.com