Bolna, a pioneering technology company based in voice orchestration, has announced the closing of their $6.3 million seed round. The venture round was led by General Catalyst, one of the most innovative venture capital firms known for pursuing innovative tech ventures. Bolna aims to enhance the Indian market by developing a platform that integrates and manages various AI voice technologies, thereby offering enterprises flexibility in voice model selection.
The company’s orchestration layer is the key to businesses. Most importantly, it lets them choose the best voice model available for their unique requirements. Bolna’s advanced platform is designed to mold voice models to suit diverse requirements, providing an adaptable solution for enterprises operating in a fast-evolving technological landscape.
Bolna’s solutions are customized to address the peculiar challenges of the Indian market. They might include noise cancelling or multiple language functions. With this emphasis on localization, Bolna has established themselves as a key contender within the Indian AI voice technology landscape. The addition of Truecaller’s ID verification for caller and spam ID verification takes the company’s value prop to another level, providing an even greater user experience and security assurance.
Today, Bolna is handling more than 200,000 calls on a daily basis showing its capacity and demand in the Indian market itself. The company is on pace to top $700k ARR. This milestone, while remarkable in its own right, is exceptional when considering its rapid growth trajectory. Today, nearly 75% of Bolna’s revenue is from self-serve customers, proof of product-market fit and customer adoption.
To support its expanding operations, Bolna has assembled a team of nine forward-deployed engineers who collaborate closely with large enterprises. The company is actively adding two to three engineers each month to bolster its engineering capabilities and ensure that it can meet the growing demands of its clientele.
As co-founder of Bolna, Akarsh Shrivastava put it, their platform is so flexible that—
“Bolna allows you the freedom to choose any model and has a stack behind it to mould it according to your requirement. It’s a good option for people who want to own some part of the stack, want flexibility in model picking, and want to be able to maintain those products themselves.”
This flexibility gives clients the ability to quickly change models without any disruptions, or use multiple models across different locales to get the best output possible. Maitreya Wagh, another co-founder, elaborated on the importance of their orchestration layer:
“Our platform allows customers to switch models easily or even use different models for different locales to get the best out of them. An orchestration layer is necessary for enterprises to ensure they are getting the best models because one model can be better today and another one can be better tomorrow.”
While everyone is excited about the optimism surrounding Bolna’s creative tech-focused approach, many industry experts have voiced cynicism about whether the market will accept it. A statement from a source at Y-Combinator highlighted potential concerns:
“Great to see that you have a product that can create realistic voice agents, but Indian enterprises are not going to pay, and you are not going to make money out of this.”
In light of these challenges, Bolna is still working on distinguishing their product and getting more penetration in the market. The company is focused on developing easy-to-use solutions. This flexible, smart approach empowers businesses and represents thoughtful recognition of the varied, complex needs in the Indian market.
