**: Hunting Cloud Selection, Wen Wang Fei
The craze for large models is still surging: OpenAI's Wensheng ** model SORA has attracted widespread attention, and the post-90s Tsinghua Xueba has a one-year valuation of ...... $2.5 billionHowever, a "bad news" quietly hit the NLP unicorn!
On the evening of February 21, a screenshot of Emotibot's internal letter went viral in the industry. Screenshots from the Internet show that the company has stopped production for 6 months since February 20.
In response to this matter, Emotibot urgently issued an "official statement" today, saying that the "shutdown and shutdown" is a misinterpretation and a false report.
However, Emotibot also admits that it is indeed "difficult to operate": it is optimizing some loss-making businesses, including the work restructuring plan of some positions, and a small number of positions have been suspended.
From 2018 to 2023, Emotibot, which has been raising funds every year, can be called the "darling of capital", and there are many well-known investors such as Bank of China International, Bank of Communications International, Yunhui Capital, Lingfeng Capital, Hubble Investment, Ecovacs and other well-known institutions.
At a time when the popularity of large models is rising, the former star enterprises are on the verge of "sloppy exit", why not?
Emotibot Intelligent Technology (Shanghai)** was founded in August 2015 by Jian Renxian, a big star in the field of artificial intelligence.
According to public information, Jian Renxian studied at the University of Southern California (U.Cs.c.After obtaining a master's degree in computer science, he engaged in the research and development and application of artificial intelligence in the early 90s. He joined Microsoft in 2006 and was appointed Vice President of Microsoft (Asia) Internet Engineering Academy in 2012, responsible for the technical development, product implementation and strategic planning of Microsoft's search, Bing Advertising, Bing Mobile and artificial intelligence products in the Asia-Pacific region.
In 2015, Jian Renxian, who had been working at Microsoft for nearly 10 years, realized that the era of artificial intelligence had arrived. At this time, his Microsoft Xiaoice has also achieved initial success. So under the touch of the sci-fi movie "HER", he resolutely resigned and founded Emotibot.
With a strong background, accompanied by artificial intelligence 10 era dividend, Emotibot received 25 million US dollars in angel investment.
Since then, from 2018 to 2023, Emotibot has also been the "darling of capital". In less than 5 years, 6 rounds of financing have been completed according to the rhythm of one round a year.
The latest round of funding announced by Emotibot was in February 2023, when the ChatGPT craze was just emerging. At that time, Emotibot announced that it would complete the D2 round of financing at the end of 2022, which was jointly invested by Gimpo Investment, Treasury Capital, Jiangsu Cultural Investment, Junci Capital, etc., and the financing amount was not disclosed.
So far, Emotibot has completed 7 rounds of financing since its establishment, with a total financing of more than 1 billion yuan, and its valuation has already reached the unicorn standard.
However, since the completion of the transformation in 2022 and the beginning of ChatGPT sweeping the world, Emotibot, which released similar products, has failed to stand at the forefront as expected.
The screenshot of the online transmission shows that since 2023, Emotibot's business needs have been greatly reduced, which has brought serious cash flow pressure and challenges to the company. As a result, the company decided to make business adjustments.
In view of the loss-making business lines, Emotibot plans to optimize some departments and positions from now on (February 20) and reorganize, and the shutdown time is set at 6 months.
The words "shutdown and shutdown" instantly attracted the general attention of industry insiders, and as the rumors intensified, Emotibot urgently issued the "Official Statement" today. In a nutshell, it is not a complete shutdown, but only a part of the loss-making business is optimized.
As for future development, Emotibot said, "We are confident in our business prospects and opportunities to explore new technologies and products, and we are committed to strengthening the sustainable development of our core products and businesses to ensure our competitive edge in the AIGC field." ”
As an artificial intelligence company established nearly 10 years ago, the development of Emotibot seems to be in line with the breathing pulse of the times. After "flowers are brocade, fire cooking oil", "cold winter" is quietly coming, and it has also become one of the earliest enterprises to transform.
According to the official introduction, since 2022, Emotibot has fully transformed into a PLG (Product LED Growth) enterprise, implementing the PLG concept into R&D, products and sales, combining the latest generative AI technology and large and small model dual engines to accelerate the implementation of the PLG industry.
In 2023, ChatGPT will set off a global wave. Therefore, while receiving the D2 round of financing in February, Emotibot also announced that it would use the unique barriers accumulated over the years of polishing to create a "ChatGPT-like" generative AI and large language model to enter the AIGC field.
According to reports, Emotibus has launched a variety of intelligent creation and writing software, such as Magic Writer, Wendroid, Inspiration Flash, etc., and launched an enterprise-level Gemini GPT product series, including an enterprise conversation robot based on large language models and generative AI, ChatSearch, an interactive cognitive search engine, and a new AI sparring partner and enterprise employee assistant, etc., to improve the productivity of knowledge producers such as white-collar workers. Help enterprises better complete digital and intelligent transformation.
Just 4 months later, Emotibot officially launched the "1+4" large-scale model product system on June 18, 2023, and positioned itself as "the last mile to open up the large-scale model landing for enterprises". Subsequently, the company successively announced strategic cooperation with Chinasoft International, Huawei Cloud, Zhipu AI, Sugon and other enterprises.
According to the information on the official website, Emotibot has established 6 platform products, including Bot Factory conversational AI platform, Gemini knowledge engineering platform, AICC+ solution platform, NLP natural language processing platform, Scorpio automated machine learning platform, WFEA super workflow automation platform, and has established 6 platform products, including AI + finance, AI + enterprise, AI + health care, AI + manufacturing, AI + intelligent terminal, and AI +Provide complete solutions in government affairs and other fields.
It is worth mentioning that Jian Renxian once mentioned, "You can't sing a high profile to make a big model, and enterprises need low-cost, civilian model products." To this end, he plans to "set up a 990,000 large model laboratory", that is, to allow enterprises to build a large model of their own within a budget of 990,000 yuan, so that the large model becomes more civilian.
On the surface, the development of Emotibot is "blameless". It should be noted that along with the internal letter, there are also rumors that "Emotibot emphasizes that traditional NLP and large models go hand in hand, and the transformation is not complete", which may reveal the embarrassing situation faced by the company to a certain extent.
In contrast, Emotibot failed to "successfully transform" like star NLP companies such as Zhipu AI, Circular Intelligence, Xiaoice Company, and Chayi Technology, and embarked on a smooth road.
Among them, Yang Zhilin, the founder of Circular Intelligence, started a new company - the dark side of the moon. Just three days ago, the company was revealed to have completed a new round of financing of more than $1 billion, with investors including Sequoia China, Xiaohongshu, Meituan, and Alibaba, followed by old shareholders, with a post-investment valuation of about $2.5 billion.
And Chayi Technology will have news of layoffs in 2022. Founder Wu Yue said at the time, "Since 2019, I have experienced a period of 'sitting on the cold bench'". Since then, the company has actively carried out internal reforms, and successfully launched vertical models in the field of services and marketing under the boom of large models, which can be regarded as a successful "out of the quagmire".
In the future, we will continue to pay attention to whether Emotibot will make a beautiful comeback like Chayi Technology.