A startup that uses robots to write news gets acquired for $80 million in cash
"We aren't disclosing the amount, but I will say two things about the financials," founder and CEO Robbie Allen told TechCrunch. "Our shareholders are very happy with their return, and we were already in a strong financial position."
Sorry Robbie! But we know the price.
Ai was acquired for $80 million in an all-cash deal, a source with knowledge of the deal tells Business Insider.
Ai, which is headquartered in Durham, North Carolina, was founded in 2007. It raised $10.8 million from investors such as former AOL executive Steve Case and Samsung Ventures. Vista also acquired a competitor of Ai, STATS, last June. Both STATS and Ai use technology to turn data into articles that read like they were written by humans. STATS specializes in sports content; Ai produces real-estate, marketing, finance and sports content.
What does a $14 billion PE firm want with robo-news companies?
Allen explained some of the logic behind acquisition in a blog post. Vista owns 26 companies, and Allen thinks he can help those companies leverage their data. "Vista's resources and STATS' distribution will allow us to fast-track our Wordsmith natural language generation (NLG) platform across multiple industries," Allen writes.
The Associated Press works with Ai and increased the number of articles it produces ten-fold, Ai says. Here's an example of an Ai-written AP article:
Allen did not return multiple requests for comment.