Blok is a newish startup, founded by London-based, serial entrepreneurs Tom Charman and Olivia Higgs in 2024. It’s revolutionizing the app development ecosystem by harnessing the power of artificial intelligence (AI) personas to mimic real-world usage. The company is smartly playing product hard to get by putting its product behind a waitlist. Today, it’s zeroed in on that first set of customers across the finance and healthcare industries. This strategy allows Blok to flex their skills developing and honing tailored solutions for these industries. At the same time, it gives them a managed rollout.
Operating under a Software as a Service (SaaS) model, Blok is working on balancing its compute costs as it scales. The buzzy little company is planning to bring in revenue in the mid-single-digit millions this year and has announced plans to continue growing its customer base. It’s a model that seems to be working, as Blok easily raised $7.5 million in two funding rounds. In the pre-seed round, they raised $2.5 million with backing from Protagonist, Rackhouse, Ryan Hoover’s Weekend Fund and Blank Ventures. The seed round, which was completely filled by demand, closed at $5M, led by MaC Venture Capital. The funding was joined by professionals specializing in building global communities from Discord, Google, Meta, Apple, Snap, and Pinterest.
Blok’s innovative simulation engine distinguishes it from existing AI-powered coding tools by offering a predictive layer of testing for applications. This engine allows development teams to anticipate user behavior before any code is written, significantly enhancing the decision-making process in product development. Charman and Higgs highlight the importance of this capacity. They highlight its ability to help companies avoid the traps that come with traditional testing approaches, which rely too much on A/B tests and gut feel.
“We backed Blok because we believe product development is at an inflection point. Teams are shipping faster than ever, but they’re still making critical decisions based on A/B tests and gut instinct. Blok’s simulation engine flips that model — giving teams the ability to predict user behavior before a single line of code is written,” – Marlon Nichols.
Blok’s technology conducts behavioral modeling and develops segmented, diverse user personas that help app developers test a variety of hypotheses. Blok breaks down how users interact with specific, targeted features. This collaborative process results in specific, actionable insights and recommendations that allow developers to better iterate and improve their products.
The development process begins when teams submit a Figma design along with experiment details, including their hypothesis and user goals, to Blok. This iterative approach keeps user experience at the heart of development from day one.
Olivia Higgs, writing for X Result, underscores the need for that kind of rigorous testing in our digital world.
“There is a real need for increased testing because the bar for visual interfaces is getting a lot higher. We’re seeing people interact with technology through chat, through voice. So if you’re introducing visual UI elements into the mix, you have to make sure that you are not introducing unnecessary friction into a user’s workflow,” – Olivia Higgs.
Widely compared to the likes of Optimizely and Amplitude as Blok tunes its products, it’s still work in progress. Unlike those platforms that tend to be more reactive in nature, Blok’s simulation engine allows for proactive testing and development.
Marlon Nichols further elaborates on the company’s vision, stating,
“We are trying to reach a place where companies don’t need to release their features on an experimental basis and wait for a few weeks or months for results to show up,” – Marlon Nichols.