Short answer: Inkbox, a Y Combinator Summer 2026 startup, announced a USD 5.3 million seed round led by Peak XV on 10 November 2026 and launched hosted agents. Each agent now gets its own cloud computer, right next to its own email, phone, iMessage, WhatsApp and Slack. It wakes up when a message arrives, works, and sleeps when there is nothing to do.

By Agent Playbox Editorial · Published

Inkbox hosted agents: a computer, phone and inbox

Key facts

What did Inkbox announce on 10 November 2026?

“We raised $5.3M to give AI agents a computer to run on, with their own email, phone, iMessage, and WhatsApp,” Inkbox CEO Ray Liao wrote on X on 10 November 2026, adding that the company was launching hosted agents the same day (post on X). The company blog, dated 9 November, names Peak XV as lead investor, with Pioneer Fund, Y Combinator and others, plus angels Guillermo Rauch, Henri Stern, Jonathan Frankle, Cristina Cordova and Dan Levine (Inkbox blog).

Inkbox went through Y Combinator’s Summer 2026 batch and launched in July (The SV Post). It was founded by Ray Liao, Alex Wilcox and Dima Vremenko and is based in San Francisco (Crypto Briefing).

What are Inkbox hosted agents?

An identity first

Inkbox started by giving AI agents a persistent identity: an inbox of their own, a phone number for calls and texts, iMessage and, more recently, WhatsApp, plus Slack and direct agent-to-agent messaging (inkbox.ai). Every identity also gets a public internet address, contacts and a credential vault, so an agent can sign in to services without passwords sitting in plain text.

Now a computer next to it

The new part is that Inkbox also runs the agent. You pick an agent harness and give it instructions, and it gets its own cloud computer tied to its identity (Inkbox blog). It has a real terminal: you can install packages, set environment variables and work with its files, and everything stays on its disk between sessions.

Wakes on messages, sleeps when idle

Every email, text, iMessage, WhatsApp or Slack message the agent is set to handle wakes it up, even when it is asleep. When there is nothing to do, it sleeps and keeps its files, history and scheduled jobs, so it picks up where it left off. It can also run a prompt or script once, on an interval or on a cron schedule (Inkbox blog).

Why does it matter that replies wake the agent?

Inkbox’s argument is about timing. Any agent can send an email with one API call, but replies arrive on their own schedule, an hour later or the next morning, and by then the agent may not be running (Inkbox blog). Builders either keep an agent online around the clock or build their own servers, webhooks and wake-up logic. Hosted agents remove that plumbing so the agent never misses a reply.

For users, that means an agent that behaves more like a colleague. People can email it, text it or call it, and conversations with the same person stay connected when they switch channels (inkbox.ai). That is the same idea behind the customer support triage and sales prospecting assistant templates on our site.

How much does Inkbox cost?

Inkbox’s pricing page (checked 11 November 2026) lists identity plans: Free at USD 0 with three agent identities, Developer at USD 25 a month with ten identities and a dedicated VoIP number, Startup at USD 167 a month with 100 identities and a dedicated iMessage number, and custom Enterprise pricing (inkbox.ai/pricing). Annual billing is USD 300 or USD 2,000 a year; SMS and call minutes beyond the allowances cost USD 0.03 each in the US and Canada.

The pricing page did not show a separate price for hosted-agent computers when we checked, so we list that as unknown. The SV Post reports that hosted agents sleep when idle and customers aren’t charged for that idle time (The SV Post).

How does Inkbox keep agents in check?

You decide which events wake an agent. In chat, it asks before using a tool unless you let it go ahead on its own. Its access is scoped to its own identity, so it acts as itself rather than as the rest of your workspace, and the contact rules you set on an identity still apply, so a hosted agent only talks to people you’ve allowed (Inkbox blog).

On the shared iMessage line, people always text first by sending “connect @your-agent”, so an agent never messages anyone cold, and recipients can reply STOP at any time (pricing FAQ).

What does it mean for businesses and builders?

Inkbox is built for developers and teams who already have an agent and want it reachable like a teammate. It plugs into Grok Bot, Claude, ChatGPT, Hermes, Claude Code, Codex and OpenCode, and an agent can even sign itself up by following Inkbox’s docs (inkbox.ai). A practical first project is a meeting follow-up agent that emails people and handles their replies, or an ops clerk that wakes for supplier messages.

How does it compare? Grok Bot also gives agents their own cloud computer and can claim its own inbox; Inkbox focuses on identity and channels for any agent harness. See Inkbox vs Grok Bot and our business vs personal agents guide.

What should you watch next?

Inkbox says sandboxes are coming soon, so agents you run elsewhere can use an Inkbox cloud computer to run code, keep files and serve apps (Inkbox blog). Watch for published hosted-agent pricing and international calling coverage. We will keep the Inkbox profile current.

Timeline: how did we get here?

Agent snapshot: what do we know so far?

Facts below come from the agent profiles in our directory, each linked to its source.

Inkbox at a glance

Full Inkbox profile

Grok Bot at a glance

Full Grok Bot profile

Related comparisons and guides

Agents in this story

Inkbox

business agent

Gives AI agents their own identity (email, phone, iMessage, WhatsApp, Slack and agent-to-agent messaging) and, since 10 Nov 2026, a hosted cloud computer: the agent wakes when a message arrives, works, and sleeps when idle.

Grok Bot

business agent

Always-on agents ('AI teammates') with their own cloud computer that sign into your tools and work across apps and inboxes.

Frequently asked questions

What is Inkbox?

Inkbox gives AI agents their own identity, with email, phone, iMessage, WhatsApp, Slack and agent-to-agent messaging, and since 10 November 2026 can host the agent on its own cloud computer.

How much did Inkbox raise?

USD 5.3 million in a seed round led by Peak XV, announced on 10 November 2026.

Does a hosted agent run all the time?

No. It wakes when a message or scheduled job arrives and sleeps when idle, keeping its files and history.

Is there a free plan?

Yes. The Free plan includes three agent identities. Hosted-agent compute prices were not shown on the pricing page we checked on 11 November 2026.

Can my agent message anyone it likes?

No. Contact rules on each identity decide who it can talk to, and on the shared iMessage line people must text first.

Sources

Updated