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When George Avetisov was the founder and CEO of cybersecurity startupHYPR , he expend a mess of prison term in the trenches with the company ’s sale team . He quickly realize that irrespective of how good his sales team was , they were consistently pulling in other departments to answer customer questions or fill out technological questionnaire .
“ They do n’t know the answers to most question that get ask of them , ” Avetisov state TechCrunch . “ They have to ask a Cartesian product person , they have to pull in a sales engineer . It ’s a daunting job , and these people are bright , like I ’ve worked with some amazing sale rep , but the trouble with sales is there ’s no easy way of life for them to automate knowledge . ”
Avetisov ( pictured above in the center ) decided that would be his next job to solve . He left HYPR in 2021 and took a abbreviated entr’acte from startups to play and amaze video secret plan Elden Ring ; Avetisov said he need a small downtime before being all - consumed by another startup . He launched his newfangled company,1up , in 2022 .
1up is an AI - powered knowledge automation weapons platform for sales teams that extract information from internal company data sources and databases . Sales professional can call on to 1up to chance answers to their merchandise or technical question , fulfil requests for proposal of marriage and also use it to aid make full out technical questionnaires .
The ship’s company launch publicly in January 2024 and has since amassed near 100 customers that range from startups to large enterprise customers including WalkMe and Deliveroo . The company has been able-bodied to set down a not peanut portion of these customer through an irregular marketing strategy : meme .
“ We run one of the biggest sales meme libraries in the community , and we get million of impression on LinkedIn , ” Avetisov said . “ People accompany us just from our memes . I know it ’s a little uncanny , but like , one out of three of our leads add up from a meme . ”
Now the party is announcing a $ 5 million funding round led by Upfront Ventures with involvement from RRE Ventures and 8 - Bit Capital , among others . Upfront worldwide partner Kobie Fuller is the lead investor and will take a bottom on the company ’s board .
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Fuller told TechCrunch that he amaze a cold electronic mail from Avetisov just days after one of his portfolio company mentioned 1up might be a practiced convulsion for Fuller ’s investment dissertation regarding how AI will change enterprise ’s approach to noesis . When talk about this thesis to Avetisov , Fuller tell they were speak the precise same lyric .
“ So much of how we make investing conclusion is around the beginner and George , a second - meter founding father , saw the trouble and botheration point firsthand , ” Fuller said . “ When we utter with George , he can plunk in at whatever level or deepness in a manor house you do n’t see all the time with CEOs . you could differentiate he ’s delegacy driven , he has 1up tattooed on his intimate radiocarpal joint . He ’s really , really in it ; he ’s incredibly scrappy . ”
Since the release ofChatGPTin 2022 , AI startup building for gross sales department have explode , especially when it come to build AI tools that help customer generate sales leads and with client outreach . Companies looking to bring home the bacon knowledge centers for enterprises , many of which pop up prior to 2022 , start gaining momentum , too .
Avetisov is n’t discourage , though . He said that 1up supply such a different service than the AI sales lead generators that he does n’t think 1up is competing for the same job in a company ’s budget . He enounce that he does n’t think company need all - embrace knowledge heart , but 1up ’s approach is different because it solves a specific problem .
“ When you talk to the initiative , knowledge management is not a budget point . It ’s not a hair on flak problem , ” Avetisov order . “ Our ism on this is that for knowledge mechanisation to win and become a billion - dollar sign companionship or industry , it want to be laser - focused on a part and on a section . ”
The next tone for 1up , now that it has raised this recent funding , is to scale out the sales squad . There will also be some feature upgrades , though Avetisov was n’t ready to share the details on those quite yet .
“ sale teams get a lot of crap , ” Avetisov allege . “ They have one of the hardest jobs in the company , and their tool set is horrible . They ’ve fetch so many tools for prospecting and CRMs and all that material . But when it comes to knowledge management , they have been completely neglected . So that ’s our hot take . That ’s our optical maser focus . ”
This piece has been update to polish off Jonathan Abrams as an backer investor ; Abrams invest through his fund 8 - bite Capital .
