• Artisan AI

  Participated · Series A · Apr 2025

  Artisan builds AI sales agents (AI SDRs), with a flagship product called Ava that automates outbound email outreach. The company worked closely with model provider Anthropic to tighten prompts and reduce hallucinations, and says Ava now hallucinates roughly one in 10,000 emails. Artisan reports about 250 customers and $5 million in annual recurring revenue, employs 35 people, and is hiring roughly 22 more; it recently hired CTO Ming Li. The team acknowledges early product issues and customer churn but says it has largely improved quality and targeting. Artisan is developing two new agent products—Aaron for inbound messages and Aria as a meeting manager—scheduled to launch by the end of 2025. It is also piloting a success-based pricing option with Paid.ai and has shifted to heavier customer qualification to avoid poor-fit accounts. Artisan is an AI company that builds autonomous AI "employees" and a collaborative software ecosystem for streamlining outbound sales and related functions. Its core product is the Artisan Sales platform and the AI Sales Agent Ava, launched in February 2023 to automate up to 80% of a BDR’s responsibilities and consolidate multiple outbound tools into one. The company launched platform V2 in April with Level 2 autonomy—allowing agents to craft and send emails without human oversight—and says it is developing Level 3 and ultimately Level 5 autonomy. Artisan plans to add additional agents (Liam for marketing and James for customer success) and is focused on onboarding mid-market and enterprise clients. The startup has attracted hundreds of companies to its platform, grew its team from three to 13 employees since Y Combinator acceptance, and is preparing for a Series A. Financially, Artisan raised $7.3M in May 2024 and has now secured an $11.5M seed round to fund product development and go-to-market expansion. Artisan AI builds autonomous AI employees and a unified platform intended to replace an enterprise’s SaaS stack, enabling humans and AI to collaborate without context switching. The company is led by CEO Jaspar Carmichael-Jack, CTO Dr. Rupert Dodkins, and CPO Samantha Stallings. In April the company launched V2 of its platform, introducing Level 2 autonomy for its Ava agents (an advancement from Level 1 released in February 2023), enabling agents to craft and send emails autonomously. Since joining Y Combinator Artisan has grown from 3 to 13 employees and has onboarded over 100 companies. The company raised a $7.3M Seed round and intends to use proceeds to expand operations and development efforts. No revenue figures or other financial metrics were disclosed in the article. Artisan AI is developing human-like digital workers, called Artisans, that automate end-to-end job workflows and join teams as additions rather than tools requiring constant human management. The company’s first Artisan, Ava, is a sales representative launching on December 4th and currently automates the full outbound sales cycle; she will soon be able to automate the entire sales cycle and act as a co-pilot to humans. Artisan plans to release five more Artisans next year. The startup was founded in 2023 by Jaspar Carmichael-Jack and Dr. Rupert Dodkins and is based in San Francisco, CA. It currently employs three full-time software engineers and plans to expand to a 30-person team within six months. The company will participate in Y Combinator’s Winter 2024 batch and is using its pre-seed funding to hire engineering and product talent.

• Aprende Institute

  Participated · Equity · Oct 2021

  Aprende Institute is an online professional training platform that integrates technology and digital media with instructor-led classroom activities, tracking and monitoring student progress. It offers courses across five schools: Culinary Arts, Business & Entrepreneurship, Trade Skills, Beauty & Fashion, and Wellness, and has added shorter master classes. The company plans to use new funding to attract top-tier talent, strengthen its School of Business and Entrepreneurship, and expand its B2B division serving companies and institutions. Aprende reported more than 70,000 students enrolled and over 6x growth in the prior 24 months. It recently partnered with Univision to expand its presence in the US market. Aprende Institute offers Spanish-language certifications and courses across five schools: Culinary Arts, Business & Entrepreneurship, Trade Skills, Beauty & Fashion, and Wellness. The platform uses a hybrid model of live and self-paced classes so students can attend live sessions, learn on their own schedule, and chat with instructors. Aprende targets U.S. Hispanic and Latin American learners who want affordable career changes without pursuing a four-year degree and emphasizes teaching students how to monetize new skills. The company reports 30,000 enrolled students, has grown 6X, and employs 200 full-time staff across the U.S., Mexico, Colombia, and Argentina plus 200 full-time contractors. Aprende operates a recurring revenue model charging students $40–$60 per month and says over 90% of graduates reported life improvements while 56% generated additional income. Founder and CEO Martin Claure leads the company and has raised capital to propel its growth. Aprende Institute operates an online vocational training platform that offers courses in gastronomy, business and entrepreneurship, wellness, trade skills, and fashion/beauty while monitoring student progress and connecting teachers, tutors and learners. The company is Miami-based with operations in Bogotá and Mexico City and serves students across Spanish-speaking countries as well as US Hispanics. Aprende has served more than 25,000 students and is enrolling about 3,000 new students per month. The platform includes tools to track progress and prompts connections among instructors and learners to improve outcomes. Aprende plans to use recent funding to further develop its platform, build a digital community linking students, gig workers and freelancers, and expand into Chile, Peru, Argentina and Brazil. CEO and founder Martin Claure frames the product as a flexible, affordable vocational alternative aimed at training skills in demand in the labor market.

No current team members are available.