Customer relationship management (CRM) technology developer Kustomer purchased Reply.ai, a US-based process automation software developer backed by corporates Aflac, R/GA and Westfield, yesterday for an undisclosed amount.
Founded in 2016, Reply.ai is the creator of an artificial intelligence (AI)-equipped CRM chatbot tool that produces customised responses with machine learning algorithms. Coca-Cola, Honeywell, Samsung, Sanofi and Starbucks are among its customers.
The news came in the wake of Kustomer launching its own AI-infused CRM platform, Kustomer IQ, which will benefit from Reply.ai’s natural language processing technology.
Reply had raised $4m pre-acquisition, according to Pitchbook Data information cited by TechCrunch, including an undisclosed sum in 2018 from Aflac Corporate Ventures, a subsidiary of insurance provider Aflac.
R/GA Ventures, part of advertising group R/GA, had already invested $120,000 in the company in 2016 when it joined the Connected Commerce Accelerator R/GA set up through a joint effort with shopping centre operator Westfield. Its earlier backers reportedly include Seedcamp, JME Ventures and Y Combinator.
