UK-based startup Labrys, which is building a trust-based workforce management infrastructure for globally distributed teams, has raised €17.5 million in fresh funding. As a result, Labrys aims to strengthen its position in the secure workforce management space, enabling more efficient and trustworthy coordination of globally distributed teams.
The round was led by Plural, with AlbionVC and Superangel also participating. Existing investors — Project A, MDOne, Expeditions Fund, and Marque Ventures — joined the round as well, bringing the company’s total funding to €22.3 million.
August Lersten, co-founder and CEO of Labrys, said, “Being unable to verify if a person can be trusted, if a task has been completed, or how to pay them has been preventing successful humanitarian, aid, and military missions for too long. Yet solving the issues has historically been considered too complex and too difficult, leaving organizations stuck using disparate and insecure platforms.”
“We created Labrys to solve these tough workforce and team coordination problems in logistics, risk, and humanitarian crisis response, and we’ve built a talented team to tackle the hardest technical problems in this space. We’re delighted to be backed by investors who understand this mission and want to build the future of trusted infrastructure right alongside us,” he further added.
Founded in 2020, Labrys is a British tech startup behind Axiom—a secure, end-to-end workforce management platform designed to help organizations verify, support, and compensate globally distributed teams. By streamlining operations in remote or infrastructure-poor regions, Axiom aims to help clients save time, cut costs, and mitigate operational risks.
CEO August Lersten, a Royal Marines veteran, and COO Luke Wattam, a former Army Officer, co-founded the workforce management company, bringing with them over 20 years of combined frontline experience. Drawing on this background, they’ve developed what they call the world’s first military-grade command and control system, built to manage teams in the world’s most challenging and complex environments.
From humanitarian agencies and defense forces to crisis response units and logistics firms, many critical organizations operate in volatile and high-risk regions. Yet, according to Labrys, these teams often lack secure systems for coordination—relying instead on emails, spreadsheets, and consumer messaging apps, which are both insecure and unreliable.
This outdated approach has caused serious consequences—organizations have lost millions in aid funds and managed tens of thousands of security personnel through WhatsApp, exposing major vulnerabilities in mission-critical operations.
Sten Tamkivi, partner at Plural, said, “A lot of defense and resilience innovation focuses on hardware assets. Yet, there’s been a gap around a secure, reliable system for human coordination when it matters most—until now. August and Luke’s experience on the literal front lines means they know exactly the challenges experienced on the ground and are building Labrys to solve these challenges once and for all. This is exactly the kind of mission we want to support at Plural, and I look forward to working with them to grow Labrys.”
Axiom, the flagship product from Labrys, integrates HR, task management, encrypted communication, and global payment capabilities into a single secure platform. It leverages biometric identity verification, geo-tagged tasks, and built-in audit trails to monitor missions and workforce activities with precision and accountability.
One of Axiom’s standout features is its integrated, regulatory-compliant stablecoin disbursement system, enabling instant, borderless payments—even in regions with limited or no banking infrastructure. This capability removes intermediaries, reduces delays, and mitigates compliance risks, all while maintaining full control and auditability.
By enabling secure, verifiable operations from one unified platform, Axiom is already helping clients save up to €2.6 million in operational costs. It also boosts revenue potential and ensures compliance—a vital edge as global humanitarian efforts face increasing funding challenges and geopolitical instability reaches new heights.
Since closing its seed round in 2023, Labrys has achieved seven-figure annual revenues, winning contracts with government agencies and clients in logistics and disaster relief, including deployments in Ukraine. With its latest funding, Labrys will further enhance its identity verification system, multi-party access controls, and auditing tools.
Looking ahead, the company plans to strengthen its stablecoin infrastructure, enabling clients to execute reliable, programmable payments in fragile, disconnected, or sanctioned regions—where traditional banking systems often fail.
