Customers want to be heard. It’s a simple but universal truth, Ashwin Singhania recently told me over Zoom.
“Customers are hungry to share their voice,” Singhania, cofounder of customer intelligence startup Unwrap, told Fortune. “They want to be heard, and they’re going to go and seek out whatever channel they can to share that feedback.”
As it turns out, there are lots of places that people go to tell companies what they really think. You’ve got reviews, support tickets, surveys, sales calls, Slack, and communities across social media, from Facebook to Discord.
“Every customer that leaves a piece of feedback feels that their piece of feedback is the most important piece of feedback in the world,” said Singhania. “So, they get frustrated when their feedback doesn’t get listened to or doesn’t result in action.”
The goal for Unwrap, founded by Singhania and Ryan Millner in 2022, is to make the deluge actionable. The company already counts among its customers Microsoft, Perplexity, Oura, and JetBlue. Unwrap has now also reached a new milestone, raising a $12 million Series A led by Scale Venture Partners, Fortune has exclusively learned. Atlassian Ventures, Cercano, ScOp VC, and the Allen Institute for Artificial Intelligence participated in the round, along with ex-Stripe CTO David Singleton and Perplexity cofounder Johnny Ho. Per the deal, Scale partner Rory O’Driscoll will join Unwrap’s board.
Singhania and Millner first met working at startup Graphiq, which was acquired by Amazon in 2017. While product managers at Amazon Alexa, they both faced the same intractable problem: A flood of customer feedback from tens of millions of Alexa customers.
“The most frustrating part for us was that they were telling us what they wanted in plain English on different channels,” said Millner. “They were leaving reviews online, and posting on Reddit. They were filing tens of thousands of support tickets every month, and we just couldn’t listen to them. It wasn’t because of a lack of desire or interest—we just didn’t have the resources to comb through all of those sources.”
Unwrap, in essence, uses AI natural language processing to solve this problem, analyzing massive amounts of customer data, turning that into practical ideas for improvement, rather than a misty torrent. Historically, much of that happened manually, and Millner knows firsthand what that process is like.
“It really came through a personal pain point of sitting there, manually reading Reddit, manually going through support tickets, thinking there had to be a better way, and then using this technology that we knew at Alexa to accomplish that task,” said Millner.
Singhania and Millner paint a picture of the customer review world as a jungle, where you see all kinds of things you expect, and occasionally something entirely novel. I asked the two what the wildest piece of customer commentary they’d ever seen was.
Singhania cleared his throat, aware that he was about to astonish me: “So, we were pulling in all the mobile app feedback for Chipotle, right? And a customer wrote in, complaining that Chipotle would not take their entire burrito and blend it for them at the Chipotle restaurant, and carry it out as a smoothie.”
Singhania gets it out with an SNL-worthy straight face before he, Millner, and I temporarily collapse in laughter.
What’s interesting about Unwrap ultimately is that they’re using AI to try to close space between companies and their customers, bridging a longstanding (and incredibly human) communication gap. It’s a corner of human nature I hadn’t thought about, and a small way in which everyone—despite the inherent friction in many customer critiques—is rowing in the same direction. A customer often takes the time to leave feedback because they wish the product was better, and no company sets out saying: “Yes, I’d love to create a terrible product that doesn’t give people what they want.”
“The vision is filling the world with products people love, and bringing these two groups of people closer together,” said Millner. “Who wouldn’t want to live in a world where you could have products better adapted to what you want, and then be able to form a connection with the people building them? I think everyone would want that.”
One day more…Our 17th annual confidence survey with Semaphore is underway—and it closes tomorrow. Fill it out, since it’ll take less than four minutes and your thoughts matter. Some preliminary results to one question: Should favorable tax treatment of carried interest income be eliminated? Right now, the yeses and nos are almost at a 50/50 split. Click here to take the survey.
See you tomorrow,
Allie Garfinkle
X: @agarfinks
Email: alexandra.garfinkle@fortune.com
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VENTURE DEALS
- Helion, a Everett, Wash.-based fusion energy company, raised $425 million in Series F funding from Lightspeed Venture Partners, SoftBank Vision Fund 2, existing investors Sam Altman, Mithril Capital, Capricorn Investment Group, and others.
- Smart Wires, a Durham, N.C.-based grid technology and services provider, raised $65 million in funding from BP Energy Partners and Keystone Group.
- Rad AI, a San Francisco-based generative AI developer for radiology, raised $60 million in Series C funding. Transformation Capital led the round and was joined by existing investors Khosla Ventures, World Innovation Lab, UP2398, and others.
- Oligo Security, a Tel Aviv-based application security platform, raised $50 million in Series B funding. Greenfield Partners led the round and was joined by Red Dot Capital Partners, Strait Capital, and existing investors Ballistic Ventures, Lightspeed Venture Partners, and TLV Partners.
- UVeye, a Teaneck, N.J.-based AI-powered vehicle inspection technology developer, raised $41 million in funding. Woven Capital led the round and was joined by UMC Capital, MyBerg, and existing investors W.R. Berkley, Menora Mivtachim, and More Investment House.
- Finout, a New York City-based FinOps solution for enterprises, raised $40 million in Series C funding. Insight Partners led the round and was joined by Pitango, Team8, Red Dot Capital, and Maor Investments.
- D3 Global, a Los Angeles-based domain registration technology developer, raised $25 million in Series A funding. Paradigm led the round and was joined by Coinbase Ventures, Sandeep Nailwal, Dharmesh Shah, and Richard Kirkendall.
- Meteomatics, a St. Gallen, Switzerland -based weather forecast intelligence company, raised $22 million in Series C funding. Armira Growth led the round and was joined by Klima and Fortyone.
- Paxton, a Bend, Ore.-based Ai-powered legal assistant, raised $22 million in Series A funding. Unusual Ventures led the round and was joined by Kyber Knight, 25Madison, and WVV Capital.
- Formance, a New York City-based open source financial infrastructure provider, raised $21 million in Series A funding. PayPal Ventures and Portage led the round and were joined by Y Combinator, Hoxton Ventures, and AXC.
- Naboo, a Paris-based B2B events booking software solution provider, raised €20 million ($20.8 million) in Series A funding. Notion Capital led the round and was joined by ISAI and Ternel.
- Bicycle Health, a Boston-based opioid use disorder medications telehealth provider, raised $16.5 million in funding. Existing investor Questa Capital led the round and was joined by existing investors SignalFire, Frist Cressey Ventures, City Light Capital, and all others.
- Oxyle, a Zurich-based water chemical contamination treatment developer, raised $15.7 million in seed funding. 360 Capital and Axeleo Capital led the round and was joined by existing investors Founderful and SOSV.
- Nucleus, a New York City-based DNA health test technology developer, raised $14 million in Series A funding from Neo, Giant Step Capital, One Eight Capital, existing investors Seven Seven Six and Founders Fund, and angel investors.
- Omnitron Sensors, a Los Angeles-based sensor technology developer, raised $13 million in Series A funding. Corriente Advisors led the round and was joined by existing investor L’ATTITUDE Ventures.
- Aligned, a remote digital sales room developer, raised $8 million in Series A funding. JAL Ventures led the round and was joined by existing investors NFX, Hetz Ventures, and others.
- Waterlily, a San Francisco-based AI-powered long-term care predictions provider, raised $7 million in seed funding. Brewer Lane Ventures led the round and was joined by Genworth, Nationwide, Edward Jones, and others.
- Final Round AI, a Palo Alto-based AI-powered interview assistance platform, raised $6.9 million in seed funding. Uncork Capital led the round and was joined by HF0, Linear Capital, Ritual Capital, angel investors, and others.
- Rynse, a Los Angeles-based fleet management services provider, raised $5 million in seed funding. Autotech Ventures led the round and was joined by Connexa Capital and existing investors Founder Collective and Correlation Ventures.
- Athenic AI, a San Francisco-based data analysis and business intelligence services provider, raised $4.3 million in funding. BMW i Ventures led the round and was joined by TenVC, Scrum Ventures, Stage 2 Capital, and others.
- Damdam, a Tokyo-based beauty brand, raised $3 million in seed funding. Silas Capital led the round and was joined by Habitat Partners, Joyance Asia, Fab Ventures, and Top Knot.
- Smartify, a London-based museum visitor engagement platform, raised £1.5 million ($1.9 million) in funding. Metavallon VC led the round and was joined by Pembroke VCT.
PRIVATE EQUITY
- KKR invested $250 million in Henry Schein, a Melville, N.Y.-based medical and dental supplies provider, and now holds a 12% stake in the company.
- Harmonia, backed by Madison Dearborn Partners, acquired Maveris, a Martinsburg, W. Va.-based cybersecurity services provider for federal agencies. Financial terms were not disclosed.
- Lead Capital Partners acquired a majority stake in Lieberman, a Great Neck, N.Y.-based market research firm. Financial terms were not disclosed.
- Searchlight Cyber, backed by Charlesbank Capital Partners, acquired Assetnote, a Brisbane, Australia-based attack surface management platform. Financial terms were not disclosed.
- Sectigo, backed by GI Partners, acquired the public certificate business of Entrust, a Minneapolis-based identity security company. Financial terms were not disclosed.
- Sequoia Financial Group, backed by Valeas Capital Partners and Kudu Investment Management, agreed to acquire Carlson Capital Management, a Northfield, Minn.-based wealth management services provider. Financial terms were not disclosed.
- Sunbelt Modular, a portfolio company of Littlejohn, acquired Britco Structures USA, a Waco, Texas-based commercial modular structures manufacturer. Financial terms were not disclosed.
PEOPLE
- Redpoint Ventures, a San Francisco-based venture capital firm, promoted Meera Clark to partner.
- The Chernin Group, a Los Angeles-based investment firm, added Jon Hoffman as a partner. Previously, he was at Rhône.
- Tidemark, a Menlo Park, Calif.-based growth equity firm, added Kevin Hamilton as a venture partner. Previously, he was at Toast.