Lorikeet raises $54m after 2 years of starting up

 Lorikeet,  an AI company providing AI agents for customer service and founded by  Steve Hind (ex Stripe) and Jamie Hall (Google AI) in 2023,  has raised $54 million (US$35 million) in Series A funding at a valuation north of $200m . This is after receiving US$5m in seed funding in Oct 24 and growing revenue 10x 

Investors 

Investment was led led by QED Investors, with participation from Square Peg, Blackbird, Airtree, Skip Capital, Capital 49ers, Operator Partners and Athletic Ventures.

Canva’s husband-and-wife cofounders Melanie Perkins and Cliff Obrecht also joined the Series A. Several ex Stripers are also angel investors in the platform, which uses AI agents to deal with intricate customer problems.

Customers 

Customers include Lorikeet’s agents, or ‘concierges’, are used by several Australian unicorns, including Airwallex, Linktree and Eucalyptus, as the startup takes on global customer service giants Intercom, Zendesk, Decagon and Sierra.

What Lorikeet Does 

If you’ve dealt with a chatbot at Airwallex, Linktree, Flex or Eucalyptus, you’ve probably engaged with a Lorikeet AI concierge  – which answers questions, makes judgment calls and takes action to solve problems across chat, email, and voice.

Hond says “Customers don’t want to be told how to fix their problems. They want a concierge that actually solves them.”

One of Lorikeet’s first deployments was end-to-end handling of lost, stolen, and missing debit cards—with the AI used to determine eligibility, updatethe customer’s address, and send a replacement card without human intervention.

Application of Funds 

The money will be spent by R&D and global go-to-market efforts in the next five months. The business already has customers in US, Europe, and Australia.