The angel investor who backed a billion-dollar AI startup when it was still in its infancy said he decided to invest in the company after just 30 minutes of meeting one of its founders.
Carles Reina first decided to invest in AI voice startup Eleven Labs in 2022, when he was a venture partner at pre-seed fund Concept Ventures.
Co-founded in 2022 by Mati Staniszewski and Piotr Dąbkowski, Eleven Labs specializes in advanced text-to-speech and voice cloning technology. In its January Series C funding round earlier this year, the company raised $180 million at a valuation of $3.3 billion.
Then in September, the company announced it was letting employees sell shares at a $6.6 billion valuation.
However, before Eleven Labs even had a concrete product, Reina, who was working at Palantir Technologies at the time, decided to take a chance on the firm after meeting Staniszewski.
