FRANKLIN, Mass.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Interactions LLC, a leader in speech and natural language technology solutions and the fastest growing company in customer care, today announced the completion of a $56 million funding round led by new investors Revolution Growth, NewSpring Capital and Comcast Ventures with additional funding from existing investors. The three investment firms share a focus on accelerating the growth of technology-enabled companies that positively impact consumers while disrupting existing, multi-billion dollar industries. This new investment will fuel rapid expansion of the company to meet heightened demand and further development in artificial intelligence technology that is transforming the multi-billion-dollar customer care industry.
“We are extremely pleased to have the backing and influence of Revolution Growth, NewSpring Capital and Comcast Ventures to continue to propel us forward,” said Mike Iacobucci, CEO of Interactions. “Interactions is experiencing widespread, growing demand for its speech and natural language offerings. In order to meet this demand, we’re making strategic investments to advance our core artificial intelligence technology, further global expansion efforts and strengthen the company’s marketing and sales efforts.”
Interactions technology is used by Fortune 500 companies worldwide to provide innovative products and solutions designed for the next generation of customer care. The company was founded on the belief that the combination of technology and human intelligence could improve the way businesses and their customers communicate. Its Intelligent Virtual Assistant solutions and best-in-class Curo™ Speech and Language Platform expand what’s possible in multichannel customer care by enabling businesses and consumers to effortlessly conduct complex transactions without interacting with a live agent. As a result, businesses save on operational costs while providing an enhanced customer experience.
“Interactions is leveraging and developing artificial intelligence technology that disrupts the existing multi-billion-dollar customer care industry,” said Ted Leonsis, Revolution Growth co-founder and partner. “They are transforming the way businesses interact with their customers by providing a seamless experience that eliminates inefficiencies to better service the needs of customers.”
“NewSpring is excited to join Comcast and Revolution as investors in this exceptional company,” said Mike DiPiano, General Partner and Co-Founder of NewSpring Capital. “Interactions revolutionary technology has led to impressive growth and, most importantly, thrilled customers. Mike Iacobucci has built a spectacular leadership team and we look forward to partnering with Interactions as they continue to exceed expectations.”
“Customer care is increasingly becoming a point of competitive differentiation, rather than a cost of doing business,” said Andrew Cleland, Managing Director of Comcast Ventures. “Through Interactions exclusive combination of automated natural language understanding, AI and human assisted understanding, the company surpasses its rivals and demonstrates unparalleled consumer understanding.”
This funding follows major company milestones, including:
- The company is the fastest growing company in customer care with 100% year-over-year growth (2014-2015) and over 80% recurring revenue.
- Rapidly expanding client base, currently processing nearly 1 billion customer transactions annually for leading brands in seven industries. Clients include Hyatt, Humana, TXU Energy, JustFab, LifeLock, Asurion and EyeMed.
- The acquisition of AT&T Watson Speech and Language technology platform and technology team.
- The expansion of the company’s executive team adding Jason Bristow as CFO and Deepak Batheja as EVP Technology and CIO.
- European expansion underway with data center in Germany to serve local markets.
For more information, please visit www.Interactions.com.
About Interactions
Interactions is a leading provider of speech and natural language technology that enables businesses and consumers to engage in productive conversations. With flexible products and solutions designed to meet the growing demand for unified, multichannel customer care, Interactions is delivering significant cost savings and unprecedented customer experience for some of the largest brands in the world. Founded in 2004, Interactions is headquartered in Franklin, Massachusetts with additional offices in Indiana, Texas, New Jersey and New York. For more information, visit www.interactions.com.
Supporting Quotes
“Interactions has evolved to be a force in customer care. The company’s industry-leading technology is critical in enabling innovative enterprises to deliver leading-edge customer service while slashing operating costs,” said Bob Davoli, Managing Director at Sigma Prime Ventures. “Sigma is delighted to welcome Revolution Growth, NewSpring Capital and Comcast Ventures to join in the next phase of tremendous growth for Interactions.”
“Businesses are investing billions in self-service and Intelligent Assistant technologies. Automated speech processing and natural language understanding through voice and chat channels are core technologies,” explained Dan Miller, Lead Analyst at Opus Research. “With Curo and its legacy Adaptive Understanding technologies, Interactions offers a full solution set for conversational commerce."
"Partnering with such strong firms as Revolution, NewSpring and Comcast will allow Interactions to continue on our path of explosive growth and innovation - it’s a very exciting time for our team," said Jason Bristow, CFO at Interactions.
