Optiak, the startup developing a modular operating system for enterprise AI, has emerged from stealth after closing a €4m pre-seed round worth roughly $4.7m. The financing was led by Market One Capital alongside Next Tier Ventures, EA Ventures Plug and Play EMEA Fund and Mission. The team aims to tackle the uncontrolled spread of AI tools that many large organisations now face without any central oversight.

The offering centers on an intermediary platform. Optiak positions itself between every AI application an enterprise deploys, whether chatbots, agents or automated workflows, and the models that power them. This creates one location to set security rules, governance standards, shared memory, monitoring and cost controls instead of repeating the work for each application.

In day-to-day use the system lets companies enforce policies that stop sensitive data or security threats from reaching external models. Requests are then directed automatically to the most suitable approved model that also delivers the best price performance.

The issue carries a clear label and supporting statistics. Shadow AI, where staff adopt tools without IT approval, has triggered data leaks inside 46 percent of organisations according to Cisco research published in 2025. Unauthorised AI tools now contribute to about one fifth of all breaches noted in IBM's 2025 report.

Many companies respond by locking everything to a single vendor, yet this simply swaps one problem for another in the form of lock-in and higher expenses. Optiak positions its independent layer as the way to avoid both risks.

The founding team brings credentials that appeal to large enterprises. Co-chief executives Daniel Arenas and Ignacio Gamoneda lead the company while Borja Balle serves as chief technology officer. Balle previously held senior research roles at Google DeepMind and Amazon, where he focused on large-scale differential privacy. Additional team members have held positions at Amazon, Google and DeepMind.

“Early AI adoption relied on disconnected point solutions,” said Arenas. “Enterprises now require governance, intelligent oversight, security and monitoring that operate together as one cohesive environment.”

Balle described the core idea as cumulative benefit: by linking an entire organisation to a shared control layer, improvements in speed, expense or protection no longer remain isolated but build across every part of the business.

Market One Capital led the round with participation from Next Tier Ventures, Plug and Play and Mission. Additional backers include individuals connected to SpaceX, Stripe, CrowdStrike, Amazon and Epic Games.

Founded in 2025 and headquartered in Spain with a European focus, Optiak described the round as the second-largest enterprise AI financing completed in Spain during 2026. At the same time the company launched a Design Partner Programme that lets a limited number of organisations work directly with the founders on major deployments.

The technical direction is straightforward. The remaining question is whether enterprises will adopt a dedicated control layer or simply deepen their commitment to an existing provider.