Conversica Raises $31 Million in Series C Funding to Fuel Expansion of Conversational AI for Sales and Business; Becomes The Largest Series C Ever for a Conversational Artificial Intelligence Company
Chatbots have been a topic of long discussions at MarTech Series. Marketing and Sales leaders, with a keen eye for AI and machine learning-driven assistants, always spoke highly of how important timely conversations are for their campaigns across platforms. However, there seemed a gap in the demand and outcomes of sorts for conversational AI makers. Reason: Mismatched expectations and budget.
To turn a new leaf in the history of conversational AI, Conversica, Inc., announced that it has secured a $31 million Series C funding round, the largest Series C investment to date in a conversational AI for Sales company.
The latest funding round came after a phenomenal 2017-2018 for the company. Conversica created and defined the conversational AI category with autonomous AI Assistants that engage in human-like conversations and take appropriate actions to solve important business problems.
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“Conversica continues to define what it means to deliver breakthrough customer success and business growth in the conversational AI category,” observed Conversica CEO, Alex Terry.
Alex added, “Our market traction and performance are why our current investors have doubled down on Conversica with this Series C funding round, a resounding endorsement of the hard work of hundreds of Conversica employees serving over a thousand of customers around the world. I believe even more strongly today in the power of AI to deliver an improved customer experience and to free humans from the routine work that limits us reaching our full potential. I’m thrilled that our investors share this same vision and have reaffirmed their commitment to the company’s success.”
Used by more than 1,000 companies worldwide, Conversica’s sales assistants are built on a proven and patented AI platform integrating Natural Language Processing (NLP), Natural Language Generation (NLG), and Machine Learning (ML) capabilities and engage prospects over multiple communication channels and in multiple languages.
Conversica Was Recently Granted a US Patent for an AI for Sales System
The Series C was led by existing investor Providence Strategic Growth Capital Partners L.L.C. (PSG), an affiliate of Providence Equity Partners, with participation from other existing investors Toba Capital and Kennet Partners and from new investors CIBC Innovation Banking and Savano Capital Partners. This funding round brings the total invested capital in Conversica to $87 million, including $34 million raised in a Series B round and $22 million in Series A rounds.
Investment proceeds will be used to fund global sales and marketing expansion, as well as to continue development of Conversica’s award-winning technology, which was recently granted a U.S. patent for an AI-powered system that automatically carries on conversations.
Conversica uses conversational AI technologies to power intelligent assistants that automate routine, yet important, business conversations. The company’s flagship AI Sales Assistant engages marketing leads in human-like conversations to qualify more of them for sales, freeing humans to spend more time closing business. Additional assistants work in higher education to follow up with prospective students, in the automotive industry to engage customers throughout their lifecycle, and in customer success organizations to boost satisfaction and retention, allowing employees to focus on the highest-impact tasks.
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AI for Sales Assistants Have Touched More Than 70 Million People
Conversica is one of the very few conversational AI companies with the track record of success necessary to achieve a Series C funding round. The company’s AI assistants have touched more than 70 million people, equivalent to a quarter of the adult U.S. population.
Having created and defined the conversational AI category eight years ago, Conversica is distinguished by its innovative natural language understanding and natural language generation technology; its extensive conversational data set and deep data science expertise; its domain expertise in process automation and integration; and its diverse global customer base of more than 1,000 forward-acting organizations, including Box, Chrysler, Snowflake Computing, CenturyLink, the Sacramento Kings and Oracle.
The company is a member of the prestigious CB Insights AI 100 and a three-time member of the Inc. 5000 list of fastest growing private companies and was recently recognized with a number of awards, including the AIconics award for Best Application of AI to Sales and Marketing and the Digiday award for Best Sales Automation Platform.
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“Conversica created and leads the market for automating business conversations using conversational AI and has proven its ongoing value with incredible customer growth and a forward-looking vision that spans many parts of the customer experience lifecycle,” said Gopi Vaddi, Managing Director of Providence Strategic Growth.
Gopi added, “Conversica has transformed its cutting-edge technology into a solution that delivers real value for customers in terms of increased revenue and satisfaction. Conversica is poised for explosive growth, and PSG led this funding round because it’s the company defining success in the dynamic, high-growth AI market.”
Currently, The flagship Conversica® AI Sales Assistant helps companies find and secure customers more quickly and efficiently by automatically contacting, engaging, qualifying and following up with leads via natural, two-way conversations.
Recognized by Gartner as a Cool Vendor, Conversica is a portfolio company of Providence Equity, Kennet Partners and Toba Capital and is headquartered in Foster City, Calif.
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