Druid.AI (IFC-51050)

Countries
  • Romania
Geographic location where the impacts of the investment may be experienced.
Specific Location
Bucharest
Whenever identified, the area within countries where the impacts of the investment may be experienced. Exact locations of projects may not be identified fully or at all in project documents. Please review updated project documents and community-led assessments.
Financial Institutions
  • International Finance Corporation (IFC)
International, regional and national development finance institutions. Many of these banks have a public interest mission, such as poverty reduction.
Project Status
Approved
Stage of the project cycle. Stages vary by development bank and can include: pending, approval, implementation, and closed or completed.
Bank Risk Rating
C
Environmental and social categorization assessed by the development bank as a measure of the planned project’s environmental and social impacts. A higher risk rating may require more due diligence to limit or avoid harm to people and the environment. For example, "A" or "B" are risk categories where "A" represents the highest amount of risk. Results will include projects that specifically recorded a rating, all other projects are marked ‘U’ for "Undisclosed."
Voting Date
May 9, 2025
Date when project documentation and funding is reviewed by the Board for consideration and approval. Some development banks will state a "board date" or "decision date." When funding approval is obtained, the legal documents are accepted and signed, the implementation phase begins.
Borrower
Druid AI USA Inc
A public entity (government or state-owned) provided with funds or financial support to manage and/or implement a project.
Sectors
  • Communications
  • Industry and Trade
The service or industry focus of the investment. A project can have several sectors.
Investment Type(s)
Equity
The categories of the bank investment: loan, grant, guarantee, technical assistance, advisory services, equity and fund.
Investment Amount (USD)
$ 10.00 million
Value listed on project documents at time of disclosure. If necessary, this amount is converted to USD ($) on the date of disclosure. Please review updated project documents for more information.
Project Cost (USD)
$ 50.00 million
Value listed on project documents at time of disclosure. If necessary, this amount is converted to USD ($) on the date of disclosure. Please review updated project documents for more information.
Primary Source

Original disclosure @ IFC website

Updated in EWS May 23, 2025

Disclosed by Bank Mar 26, 2025

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Project Description
If provided by the financial institution, the Early Warning System Team writes a short summary describing the purported development objective of the project and project components. Review the complete project documentation for a detailed description.

According to the Bank’s website, IFC is considering an equity investment of up to US$10 million in Druid AI USA. The funding will support Druid expand across multiple markets.

The Project is expected to lead to the creation of direct high-skilled jobs for working-age individuals in Romania, resulting in improved livelihoods and nurturing advanced disruptive technology skills in Romania’s workforce. Beyond the Company, the Project is expected to strengthen the competitiveness of the AI ecosystem in Romania via demonstration and replication and capacity building channels. A successful Company expansion has the potential to signal the strength of the Romanian AI ecosystem to global and local stakeholders, thereby inducing the increased investment and the emergence of additional companies in similar segments. The Project also has the potential to build capacity among local talent, which could result in spillovers across the local AI/ML ecosystem.

Early Warning System Project Analysis
For a project with severe or irreversible impacts to local community and natural resources, the Early Warning System Team may conduct a thorough analysis regarding its potential impacts to human and environmental rights.

The Project involves an equity investment in a software platform for building AI-enabled conversational business solutions including chatbots, virtual assistants, and voice-based interactions to help companies automate and enhance customer-facing or internal functions. Key E&S risks and issues are minimal and include: (i) adequacy of the E&S policies and procedures; (ii) labor and working conditions; (ii) emergency response and life and fire safety in the client’s offices. 

Investment Description
Here you can find a list of individual development financial institutions that finance the project.

IFC is considering an equity investment of up to US$10 million. Druid is raising a US$50 million funding round to accelerate its global expansion.

Private Actors Description
A Private Actor is a non-governmental body or entity that is the borrower or client of a development project, which can include corporations, private equity and banks. This describes the private actors and their roles in relation to the project, when private actor information is disclosed or has been further researched.

Druid AI USA, founded in 2017 in Bucharest, Romania, is a Conversational Business Application platform serving enterprises globally. The company offers workflow automation for internal and external use cases and helps enterprises create assistants powered by Artificial Intelligence (AI) that can interact with users in natural language and execute tasks on behalf of the user.

Druid was co-founded by Liviu Dragan, Andreea Plesea, Daniel Balaceanu, Bogdan Pietroiu and Bogdan Grigorescu. Other notable existing shareholders include Early Game Ventures Fund I Cooperatief U.A, GapMinder Fund Cooperatief U.A, TQ Ventures III Growth LP, Karma Ventures II SCSp and Hoxton Ventures Fund III, L.P. 

Private Actor 1 Private Actor 1 Role Private Actor 1 Sector Relation Private Actor 2 Private Actor 2 Role Private Actor 2 Sector
- - - - Druid AI USA Inc. Client -

Contact Information
This section aims to support the local communities and local CSO to get to know which stakeholders are involved in a project with their roles and responsibilities. If available, there may be a complaint office for the respective bank which operates independently to receive and determine violations in policy and practice. Independent Accountability Mechanisms receive and respond to complaints. Most Independent Accountability Mechanisms offer two functions for addressing complaints: dispute resolution and compliance review.

Druid AI USA Inc.
Andreea Plesea
Co-founder & SVP & Chief Customer Success Officer
+40729916783
andreea.plesea@druidai.com
19 Dutch St, New York, NW 10038
https://www.druidai.com/

ACCESS TO INFORMATION

You can submit a request for information disclosure at: https://disclosures.ifc.org/#/inquiries

If you believe that your request for information from IFC has been unreasonably denied, or that this Policy has been interpreted incorrectly, you can submit a complaint at the link above to IFC's Access to Information Policy Advisor, who reports directly to IFC's Executive Vice President.

ACCOUNTABILITY MECHANISM OF IFC/MIGA

The Compliance Advisor Ombudsman (CAO) is the independent complaint mechanism and fact-finding body for people who believe they are likely to be, or have been, adversely affected by an IFC or MIGA- financed project. If you submit a complaint to the CAO, they may assist you in resolving a dispute with the company and/or investigate to assess whether the IFC is following its own policies and procedures for preventing harm to people or the environment. If you want to submit a complaint electronically, you can email the CAO at CAO@worldbankgroup.org You can learn more about the CAO and how to file a complaint at http://www.cao-ombudsman.org

How it works

How it works