SoundHound

Last updated

SoundHound AI, Inc.
Company type Public
Nasdaq:  SOUN
Industry
FoundedSeptember 2005;18 years ago (2005-09)
Founder
  • Keyvan Mohajer
  • Majid Emami
  • James Hom
Headquarters Santa Clara, California, United States
Key people
Keyvan Mohajer (CEO)
Mike Zagorsek (COO)
Tim Stonehocker (CTO)
Products
  • SoundHound Chat AI
  • Houndify
  • SoundHound Music
RevenueIncrease2.svg US$45.9 million (2023)
Number of employees
260 (2023)
Website soundhound.com
Footnotes /references
[1]

SoundHound AI, Inc. is a voice AI and speech recognition company founded in 2005. It develops speech recognition, natural language understanding, sound recognition and search technologies. Its featured products include a voice AI developer platform, SoundHound Chat AI, a voice-enabled digital assistant, and music recognition mobile app SoundHound. Key vertical industries include the automotive, IoT devices, restaurant and customer service industries. The company’s headquarters are in Santa Clara, California. [2]

Contents

History

The company was founded in 2005 by Keyvan Mohajer, an Iranian-Canadian computer scientist who had founded a number of dot com ventures before starting SoundHound. [3]

In 2009, the company's Midomi app was rebranded as SoundHound, but is still available as a web version on midomi.com. [4] [5]

In 2015, SoundHound became the first music recognition service shipping in autos, in a partnership with Hyundai, in the new Genesis model. [6]

By May 2016, SoundHound had over 300 million users globally. [7]

In 2018, SoundHound Inc. announced partnerships with Hyundai, Mercedes-Benz, and Honda to provide voice interaction for their products using its Houndify voice AI platform. [8] [9] [10]

SoundHound won the 2020 Webby Award for Productivity (Voice) in the category Apps, Mobile & Voice. [11]

On November 16, 2021, SoundHound announced plans to become a public company via a SPAC merger with Archimedes Tech SPAC Partners Co. [12]

On April 28, 2022, the combined company SoundHound AI, Inc. went public, listed under the symbol SOUN on the Nasdaq. [13]

In 2022, the company terminated 10% of its staff and enforced salary cuts, and it was reported that SoundHound raised less than half of what it originally projected in its SPAC merger deal. [14] In January 2023, the company laid off approximately 50% of its employees, and offered 2 weeks of severance. In April 2023, SoundHound secured $100 million in strategic financing. [15]

In December 2023, SoundHound acquired SYNQ3 Restaurant Solutions, a provider of voice AI for restaurants, for $25 million. [16]

Funding

According to an article of June 2015 SoundHound Inc. had raised a total of $40 million in funding from Global Catalyst Partners, Translink Capital, Walden Venture Capital, and other investors. [17] This included $7 million in a Series B funding round the company secured in October 2008, bringing total funds raised to $12 million at that time. The round was led by TransLink Capital with the participation of JAIC America and Series A investor Global Catalyst Partners. [18] In 2009 it attracted additional funding from Larry Marcus at Walden Venture Capital, who had previously invested in music startups Pandora and Snocap. The $4 million funding round was led by Walden Venture Capital VII, with the participation of an unnamed device manufacturer. [19]

In January 2017, the company raised another $75 million in an investment round that included Nvidia, Samsung, Kleiner Perkins Caulfield & Byers, and others. [20]

As of January 2018, the valuation of the company had reached $1 billion. [21] Announced in May 2018, SoundHound raised $100 million from a funding round led by Tencent and joined by Daimler AG, Hyundai Motors, Midea Group, and Orange S.A. [22]

In November 2021, Soundhound first announced the merger with Archimedes Tech SPAC Partners Co to go public with $2.1B valuation, with $111 million of investments from Oracle, Qatar First Bank, Koch Industries, and MKaNN Ventures, Cota Capital, VIZIO, HTC, FIH Mobile (a Foxconn Technology Group company), and others. The transaction closed in April 2022. [23] [24]

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References

  1. ↑ "SoundHound AI, Inc. 2023 Annual Report (Form 10-K)". U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. March 1, 2024.
  2. ↑ May, Patrick (June 3, 2013). "Siri's got nothing on SoundHound's new app". The Mercury News. Retrieved March 1, 2016.
  3. ↑ "Keyvan Mohajer, Soundhound Inc: Profile and Biography". Bloomberg.com. February 7, 2019. Retrieved December 2, 2020.
  4. ↑ Rollison, Damian (January 27, 2010). "Tune identifier SoundHound announces new version with Pandora, tour dates". Venturebeat. Retrieved March 1, 2016.
  5. ↑ "Midomi Website". www.midomi.com. Retrieved June 11, 2021.
  6. ↑ "Hyundai and Kia tap SoundHound to help you identify music in your car". Engadget. Retrieved June 5, 2015.
  7. ↑ "SoundHound now lets you use your voice to find music on the road | VentureBeat". May 17, 2016.
  8. ↑ "Hyundai Motor Collaborates with SoundHound Inc. to Develop 'Intelligent Personal Agent' Voice-Control Technology". HYUNDAI MOTORS (Press release). Retrieved February 9, 2019.
  9. ↑ "First-look into a new Infotainment System from Mercedes-Benz, MBUX, powered with voice-enabled AI from SoundHound Inc". MBRDNA. September 14, 2018. Archived from the original on February 9, 2019. Retrieved February 9, 2019.
  10. ↑ "Honda R&D Innovations, Inc. | SoundHound Inc. and Honda Partner on Development of a Voice-Enabled AI Assistant" (Press release). Archived from the original on February 9, 2019. Retrieved February 9, 2019.
  11. ↑ Kastrenakes, Jacob (May 20, 2020). "Here are all the winners of the 2020 Webby Awards". The Verge. Retrieved May 22, 2020.
  12. ↑ "SoundHound Inc., Global Leader in Voice AI Technology, to Become Publicly Traded Through Proposed Merger With Archimedes Tech SPAC Partners Co". www.businesswire.com. November 16, 2021. Retrieved November 16, 2021.
  13. ↑ "SoundHound Announces Closing of Business Combination" (Press release). April 27, 2022.
  14. ↑ https://www.bizjournals.com/sanjose/news/2022/11/10/soundhound-lays-off-10-of-staff-cuts-pay.html
  15. ↑ "SoundHound AI Secures $100 Million in Strategic Financing From Atlas Credit Partners". Yahoo Finance (Press release). April 17, 2023. Retrieved July 4, 2023.
  16. ↑ Rossolillo, Nicholas (December 8, 2023). "SoundHound AI Bets on the Restaurant Industry -- Is the Stock a Buy Before the End of 2023?". The Motley Fool. Retrieved December 8, 2023.
  17. ↑ Winkler, Rolf (June 2, 2015). "SoundHound App Emerges to Take On Apple and Google in Voice Search". Wall Street Journal. Archived from the original on June 12, 2015. Retrieved March 1, 2016.
  18. ↑ Staff, V. C. J. (October 8, 2008). "Melodis Adds $7 Million". Venture Capital Journal. Retrieved November 7, 2023.
  19. ↑ Wauters, Robin (August 25, 2011). "Music Search Startup SoundHound Partners With Spotify For Instant Streaming". TechCrunch. Retrieved March 1, 2016.
  20. ↑ Yeung, Ken (January 31, 2017). "SoundHound raises $75 million to expand access to its Houndify voice-powered platform". VentureBeat.com. VentureBeat. Retrieved January 31, 2017.
  21. ↑ Schleifer, Theodore (January 24, 2018). "SoundHound, once just a music-recognition app, is now a billion dollar company". recode. Archived from the original on January 25, 2018. Retrieved September 8, 2023.
  22. ↑ Lynley, Matthew (May 3, 2018). "SoundHound has raised a big $100M round to take on Alexa and Google Assistant". TechCrunch. Retrieved September 21, 2018.
  23. ↑ "INSERTING and REPLACING SoundHound Inc., Global Leader in Voice AI Technology, to Become Publicly Traded Through Proposed Merger With Archimedes Tech SPAC Partners Co". www.businesswire.com (Press release). November 16, 2021. Retrieved January 16, 2022.
  24. ↑ "Qatar First Bank invests in US-based voice AI firm, SoundHound - NNR". NewsnReleases (Press release). November 28, 2021. Retrieved January 16, 2022.
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