Read AI raises $50 million to capitalize on strong demand for its AI pivot bot

Now that we have so many startups offering AI bots that can do everything from listening to your meetings and transcribing them to taking notes and identifying ideas, companies in this space are being forced to differentiate themselves by offering additional feature sets and integrations.

One such company, Read AI, is trying to do just that by integrating its AI bot with email, Slack, and enterprise tools like Hubspot, Jira, and Confluence. And to accelerate its product development, the startup recently raised $50 million in a Series B funding round led by Smash Capital. Notably, the new round comes just six months after the startup raised a $21 million Series A.

Co-founder David Shim told TechCrunch that the company has seen significant customer growth since its Series A earlier this year—it has created more than 100,000 new accounts among businesses and individual users—and the company was looking to leverage that growth.

“In less than six months, we doubled our registrations, active users and (monthly recurring revenue), exceeding even the most aggressive projections. We are using this momentum to raise now,” he said.

Shim didn’t disclose Read AI’s score, but said its score has increased in line with its growth.

Brad Twohig, co-founder and managing partner of Smash Capital, said that when investing, he often looks for companies that have a product-led growth model, and Read AI fits that bill well.

“I like to find companies in industries that both serve a large group of people and have a corporate component,” he said.

Product evolution

Earlier this year, Read AI began supporting integrations with email, messaging, and meeting apps, and today the company is releasing a Chrome extension that can display your schedules, meeting reports, the ability to quickly add to meetings, and meeting information.

The extension can highlight key points in long email threads and create draft emails that take into account the context of previous emails, messages, and meetings. It also highlights quick meeting notes or Slack messages on the same topics in email threads.

Email clients from providers like Shortwave and Superhuman also offer similar capabilities.

Read AI offers the Chrome extension for free. Shim noted that the new fundraising was another reason to develop and scale similar products and offer them for free.

“Wherever you work, we collect this content and give you summaries and recommendations. This is a big opportunity, but there is a larger cost center associated with it. We are focusing on expanding this market while maintaining our advantage in meeting protocols,” Shim said.

Smash Capital’s Twohig believes meeting transcription services are becoming a commodity, but Read AI’s approach to deploying its AI bot everywhere could help it become a great business.

“We came across Read AI as an assistant that showed up at meetings and took notes. But when we spoke to David, we understood the broader vision and concept of having a co-pilot anywhere. This tool will help you complete everyday tasks, keep useful notes, and enable you to become a better teammate.”

Read AI currently has 40 employees and plans to grow to 100 employees by the end of the first quarter of 2025.

Existing investors Madrona and Goodwater Capital also participated in the Series B round.