Vapi, a San Francisco-based firm that assists companies in implementing speech agents driven by artificial intelligence, announced on Thursday that it had raised $20 million in an early-stage fundraising round from investors such as Y Combinator and Bessemer Venture Partners.
A person with knowledge of the situation said that Vapi was valued at $130 million by the fundraise.
Saga Ventures, AI Grant, Abstract Ventures, and Michael Ovitz, a co-founder of the well-known Creative Artists Agency, were among the other investors in the round.
AI speech assistants are becoming more and more popular among businesses seeking to answer consumer questions more quickly and affordably, which is raising interest in firms creating the technology.
According to Mike Droesch, partner at Bessemer Venture, which has made investments in businesses including Pinterest and Shopify, “AI will fundamentally impact every vertical of the economy, with voice agents becoming a core interface for many of these applications.”
As companies from Microsoft to startups like OpenAI scramble to introduce the technology, Barclays predicted this month that the AI agent market will reach $110 billion by 2028.
According to Vapi, the new funding will be utilized to expand its infrastructure and engineering staff in order to accommodate the increasing demand.
Established in 2023, the company runs a platform that enables developers to quickly and effectively create, test, and implement speech AI agents.
By the end of the year, it anticipates making $8 million.
