Baselayer
Business identity verification (KYB) and fraud-risk platform for financial institutions, now extending to identity for AI agents.
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Baselayer, founded in 2023 by Jonathan Awad, Timothy Hyde and William Slessman, provides automated Know Your Business (KYB) identity verification, fraud detection and risk management for U.S. financial institutions. In September 2026 it announced a $35M Series A led by M13, with participation from Torch Capital, Picus Ventures, Afore Capital and Socure’s Matt Thompson, and launched an Agentic Identity Suite meant to give AI agents that transact on a business’s behalf a verifiable trust layer.
The company says more than 2,000 financial institutions use its technology and that it has helped them stop over $1 billion in fraud losses. It has about 50 employees across New York and San Francisco.
Innovation Matrix Assessment
Launched an Agentic Identity Suite alongside its Series A, three years after founding.
Automates business verification and fraud checks that financial institutions otherwise do manually; the benefit is plausible but based on company-reported figures.
A reported 2,000+ financial-institution customer base and a $35M round led by M13 indicate real market pull.
KYB automation is an established category; the agentic-identity consortium angle is newer but not yet proven.
The $1B+ fraud-loss claim is vendor-stated; no independent evaluation was found.
Business-identity fraud and verifying autonomous agents are likely to stay important as agent-driven commerce grows.
Why CISOs Should Care
Fraud and onboarding-risk teams at financial institutions need to verify that a business is real before opening accounts; Baselayer automates that and is positioning the same trust layer for agent-initiated transactions.
What Makes It Different
Pairs established KYB verification with a new 'agentic identity' consortium and cryptographic verification layer for AI agents - an extension beyond verifying the business itself.
The Matrix Verdict
62/100 — INCREMENTAL INNOVATOR
A fast-growing, well-funded KYB and fraud platform with notable financial-institution adoption (company-stated); its agentic-identity push is new and unproven.
Editorial Note: Claims vs. Verified Findings
The 2,000+ institution count and the $1B+ fraud-loss figure are the company's own statements. The funding history is reported inconsistently across outlets (a $20M Series A in August 2026 and a $35M Series A in September 2026 both appear), so only the September $35M round is recorded here.
Sources
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