AI Hustle: News on Open AI, ChatGPT, Midjourney, NVIDIA, Anthropic, Open Source LLMs: Pixis Secures $85M Investment for Game-Changing AI Marketing Platform

Welcome to the OpenAI podcast, the podcast that opens up the world of AI in a quick and

concise manner.

Tune in daily to hear the latest news and breakthroughs in the rapidly evolving world

of artificial intelligence.

If you've been following the podcast for a while, you'll know that over the last six

months I've been working on a stealth AI startup.

Of the hundreds of projects I've covered, this is the one that I believe has the greatest

potential.

So today I'm excited to announce AIBOX.

AIBOX is a no-code AI app building platform paired with the App Store for AI that lets

you monetize your AI tools.

The platform lets you build apps by linking together AI models like chatGPT, mid-journey

and 11 labs, eventually will integrate with software like Gmail, Trello and Salesforce

so you can use AI to automate every function in your organization.

To get notified when we launch and be one of the first to build on the platform, you

can join the wait list at AIBOX.AI, the link is in the show notes.

We are currently raising a seed round of funding.

If you're an investor that is focused on disruptive tech, I'd love to tell you more

about the platform.

You can reach out to me at jaden at AIBOX.AI, I'll leave that email in the show notes.

PIXIS, a trailblazer in leveraging AI for brand marketing, recently closed an $85 million

series C1 financing round.

Leading the investment was Touring Capital, which was joined by Grupo Carso, General Atlantic,

Celcia Capital and Shirtay Ventures.

The new influx of capital swells the company's total fundraising to over $209 million, arriving

as really the market industry leader in marketing.

I think that the market is obviously increasingly turning its focus towards AI-enabled solutions

and companies that are providing them.

The data from the conference board indicates a huge reliance on AI among marketers.

A majority have already integrated AI into their day-to-day operations and I think expectations

are high for AI's role in future productivity enhancements.

PIXIS is certainly catching this whole wave and they're reporting an annual recurring

revenue exceeding $50 million for the current quarter.

The company has also got a lot of, it's really got the trust of I think over 200 major brands.

We have people like DHL, Joe and the Juice, Sears, Swiggy and I think notably the company

has grown by around 140% year over year in 2023.

So obviously it's really capitalizing on everything happening in AI and they actually

anticipate hitting profitability by the year's final quarter.

So this is a good move because a lot of times when you see those kind of growth rates 140%

year over year, it's just a really unsustainable burn that is slowly running the company into

the ground.

Wonderful to hear that they're going to be profitable by the final quarter of this year.

So Shubham Mishra who is the co-founder and CEO at PIXIS kind of shared his observations

on the industry's evolution.

He said, quote, there's a heightened emphasis on maximizing profitability and ensuring sustainable

growth.

It's not merely about weathering the storm anymore but about thriving in the new normal.

So the origins of PIXIS can be traced back to Berla Institute of Technology and Science

in Palaan, Reshan, India where the co-founders Mishra, Hari and Vushkali were initially really

kind of engrossed in AI research related to art and gaming.

So recognizing the immense potential for AI and marketing, they pivoted to build a full

stack marketing platform which eventually of course evolved into PIXIS is what we have

today.

So the platform offered by PIXIS is really multifaceted and it's kind of focused on three

core pillars.

Number one is targeting, number two is creative and number three is performance.

So AI driven algorithms handle everything from audience identification to asset creation

and then performance and optimization.

So PIXIS even offers kind of like an automated ad bidding and budget pacing tool designed

to adapt to market fluctuations and seasonal variations for those that don't know in marketing.

Like there's a lot of platforms, for example, like Google where you got a bid on like the

keywords you want.

But what's interesting is in order to stay competitive, like let's say it's Christmas

time, you got to increase your bids.

But if you increase your bids over Christmas, January rolls around, sales are slower, your

bids are still up high.

So theoretically you could drop your bids during less competitive seasons, but then to

remain competitive, you might want to bump them up during more competitive ones where

you're going to make your money just off of the volumes alone.

It's really kind of a hassle to do this manually, but it seems that they've come up with a really

cool automated system to do this, which is quite impressive and definitely has a lot of

value for marketers.

So this is what they said, quote, companies irrespective of their tech proficiencies are

looking for tools that can drive results without incurring significant development costs or

steep learning curves.

And that was Marisha who said that.

So I think to this end, Pixis offers brand, you know, brands really kind of customized

learning based on their unique data and objectives.

And I think these insights power its automation tools and also provide a bunch of actionable

strategies for brands to employ.

So as for concerns about, you know, reliability of generative AI marketing, they kind of emphasize

that Pixis employs manual overrides and also fine tuning.

And this whole approach is really to ensure accuracy and quality control.

So although, you know, I didn't personally go and evaluate that, I'm just letting you

know that's what that's what they say is manual overrides and fine tuning.

In any case, Pixis is far from complacent.

I think they just recently launched a chatbot feature, which is Pixis analyzes analyzes

users or essentially kind of assists users in interpreting campaign and marketing data.

And they're also rolling out Creative Studio, an editing suite that allows fine tuning of

media generated by their AI models.

So according to Marisha, this whole suite is going to be available to current brand

partners soon and to new customers next year, right?

This is kind of something we see a lot of people come up with all these crazy announcements

about capabilities and they're like, and it's going to be available in January or February

next year.

In any case, it's it's cool that they're, you know, working on this.

I think the funding they've just raised is going to fuel a bunch of different growth strategies

for Pixis, including research and development infrastructure expansion and strategic partnership.

So plans are also underway to kind of grow its 350 strong workforce, specifically targeting

sales and business development teams in North America and Latin America, plus Pixis intends

to take on debt in Q4.

So kind of hinting at a potential acquisition on the horizon, although details remain under

wraps, they haven't leaked anything going on there.

But I think it's a substantial time for Pixis really mirroring the broader excitement around

the transformative potential of AI and marketing, which of course I personally think is, you

know, the greatest thing since whatever the greatest thing since whatever you think the

greatest thing is.

But I think with its solid growth and ambitious plans, Pixis really seems well positioned to

play a quite a pivotal role in shaping this evolving landscape.

So it's definitely going to be a company will follow as it continues to evolve and as they

have their big announcements next year.

If you are looking for an innovative and creative community of people using chat GPT, you need

to join our chat GPT creators community.

I'll drop a link in the description to this podcast.

We'd love to see you there where we share tips and tricks of what is working in chat

GPT.

It's a lot easier than a podcast as you can see screenshots, you can share and comment

on things that are currently working.

So if this sounds interesting to you, check out the link in the comment.

We'd love to have you in the community.

Thanks for joining me on the open AI podcast.

It would mean the world to me if you would rate this podcast wherever you listen to your

podcasts and I'll see you tomorrow.

Machine-generated transcript that may contain inaccuracies.