Архив рубрики: TC

Regie secures $10M to generate marketing copy using AI

Regie.ai, a startup using OpenAI’s GPT-3 text-generating system to create sales and marketing content for brands, today announced that it raised $10 million in Series A funding led by Scale Venture Partners with participation from Foundation Capital, South Park Commons, Day One Ventures and prominent angel investors. The fresh investment comes as VCs see a growing opportunity in AI-powered, copy-generating adtech companies, whose tech promises to save time while potentially increasing personalization.
Regie was founded in 2020 by Matt Millen and Srinath Sridhar. Previously a software engineer at Google and Meta, Sridhar is a data scientist by trade, having developed enterprise-scale AI systems that detect duplicate images and rank search results. Millen was formerly a VP at T-Mobile, leading the national sales teams (e.g., strategic accounts and public sector).
With Regie, Sridhar says he and Millen aimed to create a way for companies to communicate with their customers via channels like email, social media, text, podcasts, online advertising and more. Because companies have so many platforms and mediums at their disposal to speak with customers, he notes, it can be a challenge for content marketers to produce continuously compelling content to reach their customers.
“The way content is getting generated has fundamentally changed,” Sridhar told TechCrunch in an email interview. “Marketers and copywriters working in the enterprise … increasingly [need] to produce and manage content and content workflows at scale.”
Regie uses GPT-3 to power its service — the same GPT-3 that can generate poetry, prose and academic papers. But it’s a “flavor” of GPT-3 fine-tuned on a training data set of roughly 20,000 sales sequences (the series of steps to convert prospects into paying customers) and nearly 100 million sales emails. Also in the mix are custom language systems built by Regie to reflect brands and their messaging, designed to be integrated with existing sale platforms like Outreach, HubSpot, and Salesloft.
Image Credits: Regie
Lest the systems spew problematic language, Regie says that every system goes through “human curation” and vetting before being released. The startup also claims to train the systems on “inclusive” language and test them for biases, like bias against certain demographic groups.
Customers can use Regie to generate original, optimized-for-search-engines content or create custom sales sequences. The platform also offers blog- and social-media-post-authoring tools for personalizing messages, as well as a Chrome extension that analyzes the “quality” of emails that customers send — and optionally rewrites the text.
“Generative AI is completely disrupting the way content is created today. The biggest competitors of Regie would be the large content authoring and management platforms that will be completely redesigned AI first going forward,” Sridhar said confidently. “For example, Adobe’s suite of products including Acrobat, Illustrator, Photoshop, now Figma as well as Adobe Experience Cloud will start to get outdated as Regie continues to build on an intelligent content creation and management platform for the enterprise.”
More immediately, Regie competes with vendors like Jasper, Phrasee, Copysmith and Copy.ai — all of which tap AI to generate bespoke marketing copy. But Sridhar argues that Regie is a more vertical platform that caters to go-to-market teams in the enterprise while combining text, images and workflows into a single glass pane.
“Generative AI is such a paradigm shift that not only productivity and top-line of companies will go up as a result, but the bottom line will also go down simultaneously. There are very few products that can improve both sides of that financial equation,” Sridhar continued. “So if a company wants to reduce costs because they want to assimilate sales tools, or reduce outsourced writing while simultaneously increasing revenue, Regie can do that. If you are an outsourced marketing agency looking to retain more customers and efficiently generate content at scale, Regie can definitely do that for agencies as well.”
The company currently has more than 70 software-as-a-service customers on annual contracts, including AT&T, Sophos, Okta and Crunchbase. Sridhar didn’t reveal revenue but said that he expects the 25-person company to grow “meaningfully” this year.
“This is a revolutionary new field. And as always, adoption will require educating the users,” Sridhar said. “It is clear to us as practitioners that the world has changed. But it will take time for others to get their hands dirty and convince themselves that this is happening — and that it is a very positive development. So we have to be patient in educating the industry. We also have to show that content quality isn’t compromised and that it can perform better and be maintained more consistently with the strategic application of AI.”
To date, Regie has raised $14.8 million.
Regie secures $10M to generate marketing copy using AI by Kyle Wiggers originally published on TechCrunch
Regie secures $10M to generate marketing copy using AI

AI is taking over the iconic voice of Darth Vader, with the blessing of James Earl Jones

From the cringe-inducing Jar Jar Binks to unconvincing virtual Leia and Luke, Disney’s history with CG characters is, shall we say, mixed. But that’s not stopping them from replacing one of the most recognizable voices in cinema history, Darth Vader, with an AI-powered voice replica based on James Earl Jones.
The retirement of Jones, now 91, from the role, is of course well-earned. But if Disney continues to have its way (and there is no force in the world that can stop it), Vader is far from done. It would be unthinkable to recast the character, but if Jones is done, what can they do?
The solution is Respeecher, a Ukrainian company that trains text-to-speech machine learning models with the (licensed and released) recordings of actors who, for whatever reason, will no longer play a part.
Vanity Fair just ran a great story on how the company managed to put together the Vader replacement voice for Disney’s “Obi-Wan Kenobi” — while the country was being invaded by Russia. Interesting enough, but others noted that it serves as confirmation that the iconic voice of Vader would officially from now on be rendered by AI.
This is far from the first case where a well-known actor has had their voice synthesized or altered in this way. Another notable recent example is “Top Gun: Maverick,” in which the voice of Val Kilmer (reprising his role as Iceman) was synthesized due to the actor’s medical condition.
That sounded good, but a handful of whispered lines aren’t quite the same as a 1:1 replacement for a voice even children have known (and feared) for decades. Can a small company working at the cutting edge of machine learning tech pull it off?
You can judge for yourself — here’s one compilation of clips — and to me it seems pretty solid. The main criticism of that show wasn’t Vader’s voice, that’s for sure. If you weren’t expecting anything, you would probably just assume it was Jones speaking the lines, not another actor’s voice being modified to fit the bill.
The giveaway is that it doesn’t actually sound like Jones does now — it sounds like he did in the ’70s and ’80s when the original trilogy came out. That’s what anyone seeing Obi-Wan and Vader fight will expect, probably, but it’s a bit strange to think about.
It opens up a whole new can of worms. Sure, an actor may license their voice work for a character, but what about when that character ages? What about a totally different character they voice, but that there is some similarity to? What recourse do they have if their voice synthesis files leak and people are using it willy-nilly?

Spotify is acquiring Sonantic, the AI voice platform used to simulate Val Kilmer’s voice in ‘Top Gun: Maverick’

It’s an interesting new field to work in, but it’s hardly without pitfalls and ethical conundra. Disney has already broken the seal on many transformative technologies in filmmaking and television, and borne the deserved criticism when what it put out did not meet audiences’ expectations.
But they can take the hits and roll with them — maybe even take a page from George Lucas’s book and try to rewrite history, improving the rendering of Grand Moff Tarkin in a bid to make us forget how waxy he looked originally. As long as the technology is used to advance and complement the creativity of writers, directors and everyone else who makes movies magic, and not to save a buck or escape tricky rights situations, I can get behind it.
AI is taking over the iconic voice of Darth Vader, with the blessing of James Earl Jones by Devin Coldewey originally published on TechCrunch
AI is taking over the iconic voice of Darth Vader, with the blessing of James Earl Jones

Breaking Bad creator is making a new show for Apple TV+ with Rhea Seehorn

Apple TV+’s original programming has received a major boost with the company landing a deal with “Breaking Bad” and “Better Call Saul” creator Vince Gilligan. Apple signed a two-season deal for his new project — dubbed as a grounded drama — that will be unrelated to the two hit series.
Deadline, which first reported the development, noted that “Better Call Saul” star and Emmy nominee Rhea Seehorn will play a lead in the upcoming series. The report also said that Gilligan will be a showrunner and an executive producer for the new project that could see per episode budget cross the $13 million to $15 million mark.

I am OVER THE MOON excited about this!!!! Words cannot express. My heart is exploding! https://t.co/rnqGSO1AvU
— Rhea Seehorn (@rheaseehorn) September 22, 2022

While Gilligan would want another hit series to show off for his resume, Apple would be looking for more high-profile shows to fill in the void of outgoing comedy series Ted Lasso. Jason Sudeikis, who is the lead and an executive producer on the show, is currently making the third and final season of the soccer-centered saga. The series has been a flagbearer for Apple TV+, with multiple Emmy wins and now a deal with Electronic Arts to feature Richmond AFC — the team that appears in the series — in the upcoming EA Sports FIFA 23.
Apple TV+ scored nine Emmy wins this year, which is on par with its competitors like Hulu, Disney+ and Amazon Prime, with 10, 8 and 7 wins, respectively. Notably, Ted Lasso won all four Primetime Emmy Awards for Apple TV+.
The company is looking to diversify its streaming portfolio with multiple deals this year. In August, it said to have signed an agreement with Futuro Studio to turn original podcasts into TV shows. It’s also heavily investing in live sports streaming with deals including Major League Baseball and Major League Soccer.
Breaking Bad creator is making a new show for Apple TV+ with Rhea Seehorn by Ivan Mehta originally published on TechCrunch
Breaking Bad creator is making a new show for Apple TV+ with Rhea Seehorn

OpenAI begins allowing users to edit faces with DALL-E 2

After initially disabling the capability, OpenAI today announced that customers with access to DALL-E 2 can upload people’s faces to edit them using the AI-powered image-generating system. Previously, OpenAI only allowed users to work with and share photorealistic faces and banned the uploading of any photo that might depict a real person, including photos of prominent celebrities and public figures.
OpenAI claims that improvements to its safety system made the face-editing feature possible by “minimizing the potential of harm” from deepfakes as well as attempts to create sexual, political and violent content. In an email to customers, the company wrote:
Many of you have told us that you miss using DALL-E to dream up outfits and hairstyles on yourselves and edit the backgrounds of family photos. A reconstructive surgeon told us that he’d been using DALL-E to help his patients visualize results. And filmmakers have told us that they want to be able to edit images of scenes with people to help speed up their creative processes … [We] built new detection and response techniques to stop misuse.
The change in policy isn’t opening the floodgates necessarily. OpenAI’s terms of service will continue to prohibit uploading pictures of people without their consent or images that users don’t have the rights to — although it’s not clear how consistent the company’s historically been about enforcing those policies.
In any case, it’ll be a true test of OpenAI’s filtering technology, which some customers in the past have complained about being overzealous and somewhat inaccurate. Deepfakes come in many flavors, from fake vacation photos to presidents of war-torn countries. Accounting for every emerging form of abuse will be a never-ending battle, in some cases with very high stakes.
No doubt, OpenAI — which has the backing of Microsoft and notable VC firms including Khosla Ventures — is eager to avoid the controversy associated with Stability AI’s Stable Diffusion, an image-generating system that’s available in an open source format without any restrictions. As TechCrunch recently wrote about, it didn’t take long before Stable Diffusion — which can also edit face images — was being used by some to create pornographic, nonconsensual deepfakes of celebrities like Emma Watson.
So far, OpenAI has positioned itself as a brand-friendly, buttoned-up alternative to the no-holds-barred Stability AI. And with the constraints around the new face editing feature for DALL-E 2, the company is maintaining the status quo.
DALL-E 2 remains in invite-only beta. In late August, OpenAI announced that over a million people are using the service.
OpenAI begins allowing users to edit faces with DALL-E 2 by Kyle Wiggers originally published on TechCrunch
OpenAI begins allowing users to edit faces with DALL-E 2

Daily Crunch: Adobe snaps up Figma in proposed $20B deal that has some scratching their heads

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Happy Thursday! Has everyone recovered from Zoom going down this morning? Don’t worry, Zoom is back up, but if anything, we hope it helped you have a quieter day…for a while at least.  — Christine and Haje
The TechCrunch Top 3
One rival at a time: The digital design world got a treat today when Adobe announced it was buying Figma, one of its biggest rivals, in a $20 billion deal that has both investors and Figma enthusiasts pondering what will change and if those changes will be bad, Ingrid reports. Meanwhile, Alex gives his take on the deal over in TechCrunch+ land.
“The Merge” is here: Talk of “The Merge” has been with us for weeks, and today it is finally here. If you don’t follow cryptocurrency, this means that Ethereum, one of crypto’s most popular blockchains, has now switched to proof-of-stake consensus, which also means it will now consume a lot less electricity, Romain writes. And for TC+, Jacquelyn tells us why it matters that Lido, Coinbase, Kraken and Binance have a majority stake of ETH.
There’s a fix for that: Apple is clearing a path for easy iPhone 14 integration with a setup fix. Ivan has more.
Startups and VC
Today, Haje has been running around at Micromobility America. They insist on using the MMA acronym, so he’s expecting a fist to the face any moment, but so far the only risk of injury has been from neck-breaking micromobility in the form of electric rollerblades. It’s probably a coincidence that Kav announced it is spooling up a 3D printing factory for bike helmets on the same day.
Looks like mobility is everywhere these days — Matt notes that mobility startups are filling the void in a Detroit auto show that’s a shell of its former self.
The TechCrunch team has been extraordinarily busy. There’s a wall of news on the TechCrunch homepage; here’s a few of the ones that caught our eye this fine Thursday:
Like private equity, but with pocket change: Anita reports that Allocations just raised at a beefy $150 million valuation in its mission to help private equity funds lure smaller investors.
You and me, baby, ain’t nothing but mammals, so let’s invest across multiple channels: U.K.-based fintech Lightyear is extending its stock-trading offering to include a wide selection of stocks and traded funds (ETF), Paul reports.
From the shirt off your back to the shiz in your bag: Reusable packaging startup Olive creates a new model to keep clothes out of landfills, Christine reports.
We’re sure more money will fix this: VCs look the other way as they give $205 million more to Verkada, whose tech (and lax security) has been abused repeatedly, Connie reports.
To Infinity and beyond: Morpheus Space’s satellite thrusters are propelled forward with a $28 million Series A, reports Stefanie.
Pitch Deck Teardown: Helu.io’s $9.8M Series A deck
Image Credits: Helu (opens in a new window)
Helping small- and medium-sized enterprises with their controlling, reporting and budgeting may not sound exciting, but Austrian fintech startup Helu.io’s storytelling skills excited investors enough to raise a $9.8 million Series A in July.
With the exception of some details regarding unit economics and revenue, Helu shared its entire winning pitch deck with us. As these slides suggest, its founders took a straightforward approach:
Problem: “The CFO’s pain is Excel.”
Solution: “Good-bye Excel sheets.”

Pitch Deck Teardown: Helu.io’s $9.8M Series A deck

(TechCrunch+ is our membership program, which helps founders and startup teams get ahead. You can sign up here. Use code “DC” for a 15% discount on an annual subscription!)
Big Tech Inc.
Whenever Call of Duty is mentioned, we can’t help but recall Rashida Jones’s character in “The Office” giving the game a shout-out. In today’s case, Jordan was there as Activision unveiled what the game’s next generation will look like.
We won’t be undone: Amanda got “BeReal” with TikTok’s newest feature, which will have you experiencing a bit of déjà vu.
“The Merge,” take two: We know you enjoyed Romain’s coverage of “The Merge”; now Rita reports on how this has affected cryptocurrency miners.
Two giants make an even bigger giant: Want to know what happens to customer data when Salesforce and Snowflake partner? Ron can tell you.
All eyes on gaming: While Activision was over there unveiling the new Modern Warfare game, the company’s proposed tie-up with Microsoft is getting a deeper look from the United Kingdom’s antitrust investigators, Natasha L reports.
Back in the hot seat: Taylor watched the latest Senate Homeland Security Committee meeting featuring executives from Meta, TikTok, YouTube and Twitter so you don’t have to. Spoiler, they  dodge questions about social media and national security.
Daily Crunch: Adobe snaps up Figma in proposed $20B deal that has some scratching their heads by Christine Hall originally published on TechCrunch
Daily Crunch: Adobe snaps up Figma in proposed $20B deal that has some scratching their heads