Hera: Product, team and how it was built
Hera (AI motion graphics and design canvas, Germany): 100K waitlist signups in 8 weeks, July 2025. Evidence grade E: no revenue figure was checked. Team: 2 co-founders at launch in 2025; Y Combinator lists a team of 5 (read November 2026). Launched May 2025; still running.Added 5 November 2026
- Outcome
- 100K waitlist signups in 8 weeks, July 2025
- Evidence
- E no revenue figure was checked
- Launch
- May 2025
- Status
- Still running
- Team
- 2 co-founders at launch in 2025; Y Combinator lists a team of 5 (read November 2026)
- Outside funding
- Y Combinator, Summer 2025 batch; amount not published
- Group
- Video generation
- Main channel
- Creators and short videos
What is not verified
No revenue figure was found. We looked for a payment-processor profile, a founder interview with numbers, a funding announcement and a company filing. The Y Combinator page says "doubling revenue monthly" with no amount or date, and the waitlist and usage numbers are the founders' own statements from July 2025. A reader could look for the Berlin company register's annual accounts (HRB 277566 B) or a later founder interview. This story is grade E: the business is real and its product, price and customers are described from public pages, but no revenue figure was checked. Aiolum shows it as an idea worth studying, not as proof that it makes money.
Hera makes motion graphics, the animated text, charts, maps and shapes used in YouTube videos, ads and product launch clips, from a written description. The usual tool for this work is Adobe After Effects, a desktop program that takes years to learn. In Hera the result is not a flat video but a set of editable layers, separate parts of the picture (background, logo, headline) that you can change one by one, as in a design file.
Peter Tribelhorn (CEO) and Chia-Lun Wu (CTO) started Hera Video in Berlin and released it in May 2025. In their Y Combinator launch post of July 2025 they wrote that more than 100,000 people had joined the waitlist and that users had made more than 50,000 animations. The company is in Y Combinator's Summer 2025 batch, and Y Combinator's page lists a team of 5.
No revenue figure was found. The company's Y Combinator page says it is "doubling revenue monthly" but gives no amount and no date. This page is therefore grade E: it shows a real, funded small team and its product, not a checked money result.
How much revenue does Hera make?
Each row shows the evidence grade and the source numbers from the list at the end of this page. The grades are explained in How Aiolum verifies.
| Fact | Value | Grade | How we know | Sources |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Launch | May 2025 | C | Y Combinator company page: "We launched in May 2025". The launch post says it was first released to creators in the founders' network. | [1] |
| Waitlist | more than 100,000 signups in 8 weeks | C | Y Combinator company page and the founders' launch post of 10 July 2025. Company statement, not checked by anyone else. | [1] |
| First week of use | 3,000 users, more than 15,000 animations | C | Founders' Y Combinator launch post, July 2025. | [1] |
| Animations made by July 2025 | more than 50,000 | C | Founders' Y Combinator launch post. | [1] |
| Months from launch to the waitlist figure | 2 | calc | Calculated: May 2025 to July 2025. | [1] |
| Founders | Peter Tribelhorn (CEO), Chia-Lun Wu (CTO) | C | Y Combinator page and Product Hunt makers list. Both are managing directors of Hera Video GmbH in the company's legal notice. | [1, 4, 7] |
| Team size | 5 | C | Y Combinator company page, read 5 November 2026. The careers page says "A small team of designers and engineers". | [1, 10] |
| Funding | Y Combinator, Summer 2025 batch | C | Y Combinator company page. The home page shows a "Backed by" Y Combinator badge. The amount was not found in a downloaded source. | [1, 2] |
| Company | Hera Video GmbH, Berlin (HRB 277566 B); copyright line Hera Video, Inc. | C | Legal notice (Impressum) and site footer. | [4, 2] |
| Product Hunt | posted 8 August 2025, 511 votes | C | Product Hunt API record read 5 November 2026. The home page shows a "#1 Product of the Day" badge. | [7, 2] |
| Pro price | US$40 a month | C | Creator Program page: "On Pro ($40 a month) you get $20 a month until you reach $250." | [3] |
| Affiliate commission | 50% of payments, up to US$250 per paying user | C | Creator Program page. Referred users get 15% off the first month. Sponsored posts must be marked #ad. | [3] |
| Revenue | not published | E | The Y Combinator page says "doubling revenue monthly" with no figure and no date. | [1] |
How to read this table: a grade C value is a statement by the company or its founders on a page they control (their site or their Y Combinator page). A grade D value comes from a third party that did not check it. A "calc" value was computed on this page. No revenue figure exists, so no row is grade A or B.
| Plan | Per month, billed yearly (US$) | Per month, billed monthly (US$) | Limit |
|---|---|---|---|
| Free | 0 | 0 | limited use; 'Get started for free' on the home page |
| Standard | named on the Creator Program page; price not published | ||
| Pro | 40 | stated on the Creator Program page | |
| API and MCP | for developers; price not published |
Hera has no public pricing page (hera.video/pricing returned 404 on 5 November 2026); prices are shown inside the app. The Creator Program page states that Pro costs US$40 a month and mentions a Standard plan without a price. The terms say plans are subscriptions with credits and that fees are not refunded except where the law requires it. Third-party review sites give prices that do not agree with each other, so they are not used here.
When did Hera launch, and how did it grow?
From a hiring problem at a YouTube channel business to a Y Combinator company, in about one year. Each entry carries its grade.
- Before 2025CTribelhorn buys and runs YouTube channels with more than 30 million subscribers in total and produces more than 240 videos. Wu builds Vyond Studio, an online video editor, and is first engineer at Flagright. [1]
- Summer 2024CThe two, friends for five years, decide to build something together. [1]
- May 2025CHera is released to creators in the founders' network. 3,000 users make more than 15,000 animations in the first week. [1]
- 10 July 2025CLaunch post on Y Combinator: more than 100,000 people on the waitlist, more than 50,000 animations made. Summer 2025 batch. [1]
- 8 August 2025CProduct Hunt launch, 511 votes; the site later shows a "#1 Product of the Day" badge. [7, 2]
- November 2026CThe site now calls Hera "the AI-native creative canvas": images, design and animation on one canvas, with several AI agents at once, an API, an MCP server and a creator affiliate program. [2, 3]
Why did Hera work?
Four causes, in the order they mattered. Each one is a reusable lesson.
The founder was the customer
Tribelhorn wrote that he paid motion designers thousands of dollars every week for his YouTube channels. He knew which animations channels need (infographics, text, maps) and how long they take in After Effects. The founders also said they talked to 130 video teams before the launch post.
Editable output, not a flat video
Most AI video tools give back a finished clip that you cannot change part by part. Hera gives layers that can be edited by hand or by prompt. A reviewer describes the output as code-based, which is what makes it editable.
Released to creators first
The first users were creators from the founders' YouTube network. In the founders' words, people started talking about Hera on the internet and the waitlist grew to more than 100,000. The site now hosts creators' review videos and pays creators a 50% share of what referred users pay.
Waitlist, then Y Combinator
The waitlist and usage numbers came before the Y Combinator batch and were the main evidence in the launch post.
How it was built
Hera publishes few technical details. These come from the company's own pages and one reviewer, grade C or D. [9, 6, 8, 5, 2]
- A web app at app.hera.video, linked from every page of the site.
- Exports MP4, GIF and transparent MOV, according to the company's 'Learn more' page.
- Which AI models it uses is not published. The subprocessors page says model-provider details are given to enterprise customers on request.
- A competitor's comparison page describes Hera's output as code-based animation that stays editable after generation.
- An API and an MCP server let developers and AI agents create animations from their own software.
- The terms say Hera does not use customers' uploaded content to train machine-learning models without consent.
Tools named in the sources
Each one opens its page in the Tools tab, with every story that uses it.
Who tried this before Hera, and why did they fail?
Three companies in our database of failed startups tried to make animation easier for people who do not use professional tools. The values below are from that database and are not independently verified.
Haiku
The promiseHigh-fidelity animations for designers that plug directly into code.
Why it diedFigma and Adobe XD added prototyping and animation features, so a separate tool was less needed.
Real Artists
The promiseA cloud animation studio where small teams work together without expensive software.
Why it diedAdobe and Autodesk added collaboration to tools that artists already used, and it did not win large clients.
Fuzzwich
The promiseDrag-and-drop animated videos for casual users and small businesses.
Why it diedNo working business model, users moved to phones, and larger animation tools took the market.
The failed startups come from our database of 1,749 dead startups, retold here in our own words. Its entries are AI-assisted summaries of public sources, so these cards carry no evidence grade.
What changed
All three tried to make animation easy with a simpler interface, and the large tools (Adobe, Figma, Autodesk) added the same features. Hera's difference is that the user does not operate the tool at all at first: a written description produces the animation, and the editing comes after. That removes the years of learning that After Effects needs.
The same change helps competitors. Canva, Adobe and many funded AI video companies can also put text-to-animation into products that customers already pay for, so Hera has to win on the quality and editability of its output.
Can one person copy Hera now?
The product, hard. The approach, yes.
A rendering engine for editable animation, an AI layer and a team of five with Y Combinator money is not a one-person build. What a solo founder can copy is the approach: pick a costly task you paid for yourself, automate the boring part while keeping the creative control, and launch to the community you already belong to.
Where it is still open: Other kinds of professional design work that still need years of training in one program: 3D product renders, sound design for video, and slide animation.
- 1Write down what you paid freelancers for in your last business, and how many hours each job took.
- 2Build the tool so the output stays editable, not a final file the user must accept or regenerate.
- 3Release it first to people you know in that field, and ask them to post their results.
- 4Pay creators a share of revenue for the users they bring, with sponsored posts marked as ads.
What could go wrong for Hera?
The risks are the mirror image of the causes above.
What is not verified
No revenue figure was found. We looked for a payment-processor profile, a founder interview with numbers, a funding announcement and a company filing. The Y Combinator page says "doubling revenue monthly" with no amount or date, and the waitlist and usage numbers are the founders' own statements from July 2025. A reader could look for the Berlin company register's annual accounts (HRB 277566 B) or a later founder interview.
Competition
The founders' launch post names Adobe After Effects as the tool they replace. A competitor, Motionflare, published a comparison page that positions its own product for complete marketing videos and Hera for single animations; such pages are written by a rival and are not neutral. Canva, Adobe and other AI video companies can add prompt-to-animation features to products that customers already use.
Dependence on model providers
Hera does not publish which AI models it uses. Its subprocessors page says model-provider details depend on plan and contract and are shared with enterprise customers on request. If a provider changes prices or terms, Hera's costs change with it.
Paid creator promotion
The Creator Program pays creators 50% of what their referred users pay, up to US$250 per user, and some larger channels also get a fee per video. The rules require posts to be marked #ad. Reviews of Hera on YouTube may therefore be paid, and the site hosts some of these videos.
Sources
The grade next to each source is the best grade that the source can support. "Read in full" means that the text of the page was downloaded and the numbers were checked in it.
- C Y Combinator company page: Hera, The AI-native creative canvas (Summer 2025), with the founders' launch post of 10 July 2025Read in full on 5 November 2026, including the company data and the launch post embedded in the page. Source for the launch date, waitlist, usage numbers, team size, founders' backgrounds and the batch.
- C Hera home pageRead in full on 5 November 2026. Source for the product description, the Y Combinator and Product Hunt badges and the customer logos.
- C Hera Creator ProgramRead in full. Source for the Pro price, the Standard plan name and the affiliate terms.
- C Hera Impressum (legal notice)Read in full. Source for the company name, address, register number and managing directors.
- C Hera Terms of ServiceRead the sections on subscriptions, user content and refunds.
- C Hera Subprocessors pageRead in full. Says model-provider details are shared with enterprise customers on request.
- C Product Hunt API record for post 1002876, Hera: Your AI Motion DesignerRead the record from the official Product Hunt API on 5 November 2026 (post date, votes, makers).
- D Motionflare: Hera.video, Pricing, Free Plan and AlternativesRead in full. A competitor's comparison page, verified by its author in July 2026. Used only for the description of Hera's output as code-based and for the competition note.
- C Hera: Learn more about Hera AI motion graphicsRead in full. Source for the export formats.
- C Hera Careers pageRead in full. Source for "A small team of designers and engineers".
- C Hera video page: AI motion tool is back after 4 monthsRead the transcript of a creator's review video hosted on Hera's site. Shows the creator channel as a source of users.
- C Database of failed startups, local exportLocal export. AI-written summaries, not independently verified. Source for the failed predecessors.
Run this company? Send corrections or a verified figure to aiolum@livyden.com