Phia AI raises $35M
Phia AI, a fashion app associated with Phoebe Gates, raised $35 million in a Series A at a $185 million valuation, according to coverage shared on social media. (x.com) The financing has prompted public discussion about influencer marketing budgets and the app’s positioning in fashion tech. (x.com)
Phia, the shopping app co-founded by Phoebe Gates and Sophia Kianni, raised $35 million in a Series A in January. (techcrunch.com) TechCrunch reported the round was led by Notable Capital, with Khosla Ventures and returning investor Kleiner Perkins also participating. The company was about 10 months old when the deal closed. (techcrunch.com) The new financing followed an $8 million seed round announced in September 2025. That earlier round included celebrity investors such as Kris Jenner, Sara Blakely and Sheryl Sandberg. (techcrunch.com; techcrunch.com) Phia sells itself as a shopping assistant, not a fashion label. Its app and browser tools compare prices on new and secondhand items and flag whether a listing looks high, typical or fair. (phia.com; wwd.com) When Gates and Kianni launched Phia in April 2025, they said the app drew on a database of 250 million secondhand items across more than 40,000 retail and resale sites. Resale partners named at launch included The RealReal, Vestiaire Collective, ThredUp, StockX, eBay and Poshmark. (wwd.com) By September 2025, the founders said Phia had around 500,000 users and had expanded search across more than 300 million fashion items. By January 2026, TechCrunch reported hundreds of thousands of monthly active users, 11 times revenue growth since launch and 6,200 retail partners. (techcrunch.com; techcrunch.com) The pitch lands in a crowded part of online shopping: tools that promise to find better prices, surface resale listings and keep shoppers inside one interface. Phia’s website says users can save finds in collections, track price drops and shop through a mobile app tied to Safari. (phia.com) The founders have also tied the company to two audiences at once. Gates came into the startup with fashion-world visibility, while Kianni had already built a public profile as a climate activist and former United Nations adviser, and TechCrunch said the company has leaned on both consumer appeal and sustainability language. (wwd.com; sophiakianni.com; techcrunch.com) Public debate around the round has focused less on whether the money was raised and more on what exactly investors are funding: an artificial intelligence shopping agent, a resale discovery engine, or a consumer brand amplified by celebrity networks. The company’s own descriptions span all three, from “personal shopping assistant” on its website to “AI shopping agent” in TechCrunch’s coverage. (phia.com; techcrunch.com) For now, the clearest fact is the speed. Phia launched in April 2025, disclosed an $8 million seed round in September 2025, and announced a $35 million Series A on January 27, 2026. (wwd.com; techcrunch.com; techcrunch.com)
