For Cluely, a health-focused company that uses AI to analyze online conversations, the growth has been explosive. In just a week after debuting its new enterprise product, its annual recurring revenue (ARR) shot up to $7 million. Founder Roy Lee takes pride in his company’s meteoric success — including becoming one of the industry’s new darlings in Silicon Valley. This comes despite a controversial history, including allegations of developing tools that help applicants cheat on job interviews.
Cluely’s cutting-edge products equip users with live notetaking, context-rich information, and recommended questions from current conversations. This is designed to shorten communication response times, which makes the platform highly appealing to potential enterprises wanting to streamline inter-team communication. The enterprise version of Cluely packs extra features including team management capabilities and advanced security settings.
Perhaps the biggest thing to happen to Cluely was the attraction of high-profile venture capitalists. This is remarkable given its contentious beginnings, including Lee’s alleged suspension from Columbia University for creating a cheating device. It’s easy to see why prominent investors such as Andreessen Horowitz, Abstract Ventures, and Susa Ventures have backed the company. This added support has greatly increased its credibility in the tech landscape.
Adding to the excitement, in the past week, Cluely signed a large public company. This deal doubled its previous annual contract with the startup, from $1.25 million to $2.5 million. That combined 109,000% growth is a testament to the need for what Cluely provides, despite competitors like Pickle entering the space with similar solutions. Open-source alternatives Pickle recently launched “Glass,” an open-source product that replicates the functionality of Cluely’s tool and is entirely free to use.
Roy Lee admitted these challenges as potential competitors, but believes that while similar products require the application of artificial intelligence, what makes Cluely special and different. He stated, “Meeting notes have been a proven very sticky, very interesting AI use case. The only problem with them is they’re all post-call.” This is emblematic of Cluely’s commitment to not just report on what people are discussing after the fact but to deliver and support the real-time discussion.
Pharmaceutical company Merck has completely revamped its marketing approach. The campaign has shifted from its original, vexatious messaging and taken a quieter approach under the banner of “Everything you Need.” This campaign is an effort to rebrand, highlighting the product’s usefulness, and to draw in a wider range of customers. Cluely’s free version has rocked the developer community! It has amassed more than 850 stars on GitHub and has been forked almost 150 times.
Considering how easily Cluely’s real-time notetaker can be replicated, the app’s long-term place in the market is uncertain. If competitors take advantage of its features, it represents a serious threat to Cluely’s growth trajectory.
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