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New funding for Trint, creator of AI-powered tool that generates almost instant transcripts that can be easily edited, follows double-digit growth in revenue & users
London (June 8, 2017) ' Trint, an automated transcription tool that creates almost instant transcripts that can be easily edited, today announced that it has closed US$3.1 million in Pre-Series A funding from a global roster of investors and tech leaders.
Trint is the first automated transcription service to combine a text editor and an audio and video player into one easy-to-use tool. Using machine learning and automation technology to quickly generate transcripts of recorded audio, Trint enables users to search recorded content by keywords, verify by re-listening to just that portion of an interview, and edit a transcript to perfection in minutes. At 20-25 cents per minute (or $10-$15 per hour), Trint costs a fraction of the average $1 per minute rate offered by competitive services that rely on human transcribers.
Trint launched in September 2016 with funding from the Knight Enterprise Fund and the Google Digital News Initiative, as well as support from BBC Worldwide Labs and Cisco. It also won the 2016 Global Editors Network Startups for News Competition. CEO and Co-Founder Jeff Kofman, an Emmy-winning veteran foreign correspondent and war correspondent with ABC, CBS, and CBC News, knows all too well the painful and tedious process of transcribing interviews.
Since its launch, the London-based startup has seen consistent double-digit growth in revenue and customers each month, amassing close to 7,000 regular users in just nine months. Trint has been hailed by Wired as 'an unprecedented voice-transcription technology' and Yahoo's David Pogue as 'a welcome new weapon in the fight against the costly, time-consuming, soul-sucking act of transcribing the human voice.'
Trint's Pre-Series A funding was led by Horizons Labs the Hong Kong-based seed fund operated by the managers of Horizons Ventures. Horizons Labs' investment is led by Bart Swanson, a Horizons Ventures advisor, a technology entrepreneur and executive who previously served as Chairman of Summly (sold to Yahoo), COO at Badoo, and Managing Director, International at GSI Commerce (sold to eBay); Andy Prozes, former global CEO of LexisNexis; Mark Opzoomer, co-founder of Bond Capital Partners and former Regional Vice President of Yahoo Europe; Belgian investors Lorenz Bogaert and Toon Coppens, founders of the social discovery sites Netlog and Twoo (acquired by IAC) and the real estate platform Realo. Swanson also joins Trint's board of directors.
'As someone who has spent thousands of hours of my life transcribing interviews, I know firsthand how Trint will completely transform not just news production but dozens of fields that rely on transcription -- from marketing and medicine to academia and law,' said Kofman. 'We are thrilled to have the backing of a stellar group of investors who share our vision for making manual transcription a thing of the past.'
'Trint is adored by its rapidly growing user base, a market that has long been primed for automation, because it does much more than save time ' it adds a whole new dimension to audio and video content,' said Swanson. 'With its dream team of executives, engineers, and developers, it's clear that Trint is well on its way to dominating the commercialization of speech-to-text.'
Kofman said the new round of financing will be used to support a wide range of technical advances that will transform Trint into an end-to-end publishing platform. The company plans to roll out a mobile app and a series of enterprise solutions aimed at meeting the demand for Trint to scale within major American and international media organizations, universities, businesses, and government agencies that have quickly become early adopters.. This summer, Trint will also launch a groundbreaking feature that will make online videos and podcasts searchable, shareable, and accessible like never before.
Kofman added that the company is in the process of doubling its current team to more than 22 employees, including five new developers, expanded customer support, marketing, and sales teams, and two new positions: Head of Product and Finance Manager. Trint will also open a North American office in late 2017.
'Trint has cracked the code in making video searchable ' something that was talked about 20-30 years ago and which has not been practically and economically doable until Trint came along,' said Prozes.
'We love Trint because it solves real issues and creates a time saving, more efficient work flow for journalists, researchers, and others involved in transcription and editing high value content,' said Opzoomer.
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About Trint
Founded in 2016, Trint is the first automated transcription service to combine a text editor and an audio/video player into one easy-to-use tool, making it possible to search recorded content by keywords, verify by re-listening to just that portion of an interview, and edit a transcript to perfection in minutes. Backed by funding and support from Google Digital News Initiative, Knight Enterprise Fund, BBC Worldwide Labs, and Cisco, Trint is transforming the management of recorded content in 13 languages with a unique collection of features that includes instant search of recorded content, easy speaker identification, instant timing, and a variety of formats for export as a text document or subtitles.
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