Voice artificial intelligence startup ElevenLabs has disclosed a new round of funding featuring investments from asset management giant BlackRock, actor Jamie Foxx, and actress and producer Eva Longoria. The company also reported that its annual recurring revenue (ARR) has reached $500 million, signaling rapid growth in the enterprise voice AI sector.
The fundraising, which the company confirmed to multiple news outlets this week, adds to a series of high profile investment rounds for the New York based firm. ElevenLabs, which develops synthetic voice technology capable of cloning and generating human like speech, did not disclose the total amount raised in this specific tranche of funding.
Background and Recent Growth
ElevenLabs was founded in 2022 by former Google machine learning engineer Piotr Krzysztof Kozak and software engineer Michele M. The company quickly gained attention for its ability to produce realistic voiceovers from text, as well as its voice cloning and translation tools. It has become a key player in the rapidly expanding market for generative AI applications.
The company previously raised a $80 million Series B round in January 2024 at a valuation of roughly $1.1 billion. That round was led by Andreessen Horowitz, with participation from Sequoia Capital, Salesforce Ventures, and others. The current round, which includes BlackRock as a new backer, reflects continued investor confidence in the technology and its commercial applications.
ElevenLabs is now approaching an ARR of $500 million, a figure the company confirmed in its announcement. This metric places it among the fastest growing software companies in the AI sector, rivaling more established enterprise communication platforms in terms of recurring revenue velocity.
Strategic Focus and Enterprise Expansion
The company is actively expanding its enterprise footprint, offering tools for audiobook production, dubbing for film and television, customer service voice bots, and assistive technology for individuals with speech impairments. The inclusion of BlackRock, a firm with deep ties to institutional capital, suggests ElevenLabs may be preparing for further scaling or a potential public listing in the future.
The involvement of Jamie Foxx and Eva Longoria indicates the company’s strategy to build connections within the entertainment industry, where synthetic voice technology is increasingly used for dubbing, voice acting, and post production work. Foxx and Longoria are the latest in a series of celebrity investors that have backed AI companies linked to content creation and media.
Voice AI is becoming a more critical interface for businesses and consumers. ElevenLabs and its competitors are vying for market share as companies integrate voice driven interfaces into customer support, accessibility, and marketing automation systems. The company has processed billions of words of speech since its launch, according to internal metrics.
Implications for the Voice AI Sector
ElevenLabs‘s financial performance and investor list illustrate the growing commercial viability of voice AI technologies. The sector has attracted significant interest from venture capital and institutional investors due to its potential to reshape how humans interact with machines. However, the technology has also drawn criticism over potential misuse, including deepfake voice fraud and unauthorized voice cloning.
ElevenLabs has responded to these concerns by introducing voice authentication tools and a public policy program that prohibits certain high risk use cases. The company has also signed agreements with major publishing and media companies to license voice data legally, a move aimed at differentiating itself from less scrupulous competitors.
BlackRock‘s entry as an investor underscores the financial industry’s bet that voice AI will become a mainstream enterprise tool, similar to how cloud computing and natural language processing became integral to corporate infrastructure over the past decade. The firm typically invests in scalable technology platforms with strong recurring revenue models.
ElevenLabs currently operates in over 30 languages and claims to serve clients in publishing, gaming, entertainment, and customer service sectors. The company maintains its primary research and development operations in New York and has satellite offices in Europe and Asia.
The company has not announced a specific timeline for its next major product release or potential initial public offering. However, the recent funding and revenue milestones suggest that ElevenLabs is positioning itself for continued growth and possibly an IPO within the next two years, pending market conditions.
Source: Delimiter Online
