ASAPP Gets $185M In Series B Round 

Artificial intelligence customer service startup ASAPP raised $185 million in a new round of funding, the company said Friday.

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The Series B round brings the company’s total funding to $260 million. Investors including John Doerr and Dave Strohm, and firms like Emergence Capital and March Capital Partners participated in the round, according to a statement from the company.

ASAPP’s technology helps customer service agents know what to do and say in real time when helping a customer over the phone or through messages. The company’s machine-learning models are constantly learning from conversations, “effectively turning every agent into your best agent without the need for manual programming or extensive training,” the company said.

“We are thrilled and grateful by this latest investment, which allows ASAPP to continue scaling and meeting the extraordinary demands large enterprises are facing as a result of the global pandemic,” CEO Gustavo Sapoznik said in a statement. “Many organizations are experiencing historically high levels of customer interactions at a time when their capacity to support is at an all-time low. By augmenting agents who are on the frontlines, ASAPP enables them to be vastly more efficient and productive, realizing significant savings while delighting customers.”

The new funding comes as call centers are backed up due to the COVID-19 pandemic. With unemployment rates skyrocketing, travel plans being canceled, and other disruptions to people’s finances and schedules, they have been turning to customer support for help. ASAPP said it’s had a “massive increase in interest” for its technology in the past few weeks.

ASAPP is based in New York, and has offices in the San Francisco Bay Area; London; Raleigh, North Carolina; and Buenos Aires.

Illustration Credit: Li-Anne Dias