ASAPP founder Gustavo Sapoznik developed software that trains customer-service reps to be “radically” more productive, winning the young startup an $800 million valuation
The problem has only gotten worse during the pandemic. Call centers for banks, finance companies, airlines and service companies are being overrun. Call volumes for ASAPP’s customers have spiked between 200% and 900% since the crisis began, according to Sapoznik. Making call centers work isn’t the sexiest use of cutting-edge AI, but it’s a lucrative one.
ASAPP has drawn this investor interest by flipping AI on its head. For years engineers have perfected artificial intelligence to perform repetitive tasks better than humans. Rather than having people train AI systems to replace them, ASAPP makes AI that trains people to be “radically” more productive.
ASAPP’s focus is natural language processing and converting speech to text using proprietary technology developed by a group led by a found- ing member of the speech team for Apple’s Siri. Its software then displays suggested responses or relevant resources on a call-center agent’s screen, minimizing the need to toggle between applications.
A licensed pilot with a fondness for classical music who studied math at the University of Chicago, Sapoznik first applied his coding skills to his family’s real estate and financial business in Miami. “I’d been doing some work in investments where you build machine-learning product capabilities to trade the markets. The impact there is that there’s a number that goes up or goes down,” he says. Merely making money didn’t excite him.
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