Voice AI startup Wispr has successfully secured $25 million in funding, led by Notable Capital, as its dictation application, Wispr Flow, gains remarkable traction in the market. The app is reported to have attracted significant interest, with users generating over 50% of their text input through the platform after just three months of use. Wispr has already established collaborations with 270 Fortune 500 companies and onboarded 125 enterprises as clients.
Hans Tung from Notable Capital, recognized for investing in high-profile companies like Airbnb and TikTok, will join Wispr’s board as an observer. CEO Tanay Kothari noted a 40% month-over-month growth in user engagement since June, further fueled by increasing interest from investors in the venture capital space.
Kothari indicated that Notable’s investment approach was driven by extensive research, including competitor analysis and strategic interviews, which solidified their commitment to Wispr. The funding will facilitate the recruitment of top-tier machine learning specialists, who may otherwise choose to work for larger firms like OpenAI.
With a year-over-year user growth rate of 100% and an impressive retention rate of 70% over 12 months, Wispr is positioning itself for further expansion. The company is working on an Android version of the Wispr Flow app, expected to enter beta testing by the end of the year, with a full release planned for Q1 2025.
To enhance user experience, Wispr aims to develop its own proprietary voice models, which will help improve personalized automatic speech recognition (ASR) and reduce the current error rate of approximately 10%. This performance is significantly better than competitors like OpenAI’s Whisper and Apple’s native transcription services.
As the competitive landscape heats up with emerging dictation apps like Willow, Aqua, and Typeless, Wispr is keen on distinguishing itself by not just focusing on dictation, but also automating tasks such as email responses. The startup is testing its technology via a closed API with select partners, with plans to expand access for developers next year.
In summary, Wispr stands at a pivotal point in its journey, with substantial funding to drive international growth and product innovation while navigating a competitive market landscape.
