Israeli-founded Zencity buys UK tech for state agencies to listen to residents’ needs
Zencity uses AI and big data to help local governments hear voices of residents to help tackle pressing issues facing communities: housing, public safety, and transportation
Sharon Wrobel is a tech reporter for The Times of Israel.
Israeli-founded AI government tech startup Zencity has acquired UK’s digital community engagement platform Commonplace, which helps local authorities around the world listen to and better understand residents’ priorities and needs.
Zencity did not disclose financial details of the deal, but the purchase price is estimated to be in the millions of dollars.
Founded in 2016, by Eyal Feder-Levy (CEO) and Ido Ivri (CTO), the startup has built a digital software platform that uses advanced AI to help local governments and authorities make data-driven decisions based on their communities’ needs and priorities. The platform gathers and analyzes millions of anonymized, aggregated data points of community feedback from various channels, such as local broadcast media, social media, and government customer service channels, including municipal website services or call centers.
“Local governments are in charge of roads, public safety and health, education, parks, and cultural activities – they provide the infrastructure that makes up our lives in our local communities,” Feder-Levy told The Times of Israel, during an interview. “They have a huge power of authority and very large budgets, but they have no way of knowing whether they are doing a good job or not.”
Demand for Zencity’s technology comes on the heels of a decades-long decline in public trust in government, and a recognition that building public trust requires that state and local governments continually engage the public.
“The tools that municipalities have today to listen to their communities are very limited,” Feder-Levy noted. “We have heard again and again from our customers [local authorities] that they want to spend that money not based on their ‘gut feeling,’ but where the need is the most urgent, or where people expect them to provide services.”

“We found the biggest gap is not the government’s willingness to do stuff in most cases, it’s usually the ability to understand what the community actually expects as a whole, and that’s what we have been addressing,” he added
Feder-Levy said that Commonplace’s community engagement software for land use projects, development zoning, and redevelopment will be integrated into the startup’s platform. The acquisition will add 100 new UK customers, including the City of London, Westminster Council, Leeds City Council, Camden Council and the Mayor of London.
“The integration will help local authorities decide whether to allocate land for housing or commercial use, or what types of amenities are needed such as playgrounds or dog parks,” said Feder-Levy. “This creates a program that is much more tailored to the needs of communities, but also creates stronger trust between the community and the local government and allows for projects to progress more seamlessly with a sense of support from the community.”
Following the acquisition, Zencity will have a global workforce of 150 workers with the majority based in Tel Aviv, compared with 120 employees at the end of 2024. Feder-Levy said the startup is looking to hire more employees mainly at its Tel Aviv office in areas of engineering, data science, and customer service.
Zencity platform uses an AI algorithm that turns millions of data points into insights about community trends, highlighting resident priorities for decision-makers in local government. Governments are alerted to these trends in real time and officials can act immediately, thus allowing for a more proactive and transparent approach to governing based on the desires of its constituents.
“The key challenge we have been trying to address is building trust in public services whether it is the police or health departments to create a cycle where local government repeatedly meets and exceeds the expectations of its communities,” said Feder-Levy.
Zencity’s AI platform is currently assisting 400 local governments, counties, state agencies, and law enforcement organizations globally to allocate resources, inform policy and develop communication strategy. Feder-Levy said that most of the startup’s customers are in the US, as well as in Australia, Canada, and the UK. In the US, the platform assists local governments in 45 states including the largest cities such as New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, and Houston.
Beyond that, Zencity also works with local municipalities and authorities in Israel, including Netanya, Eilat, Petah Tikva, and communities in the north of the country.
“During the war, we have been very humbled to support the needs of local governments across Israel,” said Feder-Levy. “In the early days, community needs concentrated around emergency management, like access to shelters, information on logistics, understanding of emergency regulation, and other concerns that residents have, so that local authorities can share messaging.”
“As time went by, needs circle around recovery efforts, how to support local businesses, how to support families who have been displaced, and residents who were in reserve duty for a very long time as they are coming back from the war,” he said.
In June, Zencity raised $40 million in Series C investment led by StepStone Group, with participation from existing investors TLV Partners. This brings the total to date raised by the startup to $91 million. Among its investors are Salesforce Ventures and Vertex Ventures.