Weekly AI Recap: Qualifying Leads with AI at Lightning Speed: Paul Kleen's Pitchit.ai Raises $2.5M

Welcome to Homebase Edition #16 - A weekly newsletter bringing you stories & insights from smart founders & tech leaders who are leveraging AI to build game-changing companies.

What’s on tap today:

• Weekly Founder Story (On our new Youtube channel!)

• Weekly AI Headline Recap

• Emerging AI Trend

AI FOUNDER SPOTLIGHT
1 Founder story

Paul Kleen's Journey with Pitchit: $2.5M Boost for High-Volume Lead Qualification

Paul Kleen, a former data scientist turned entrepreneur, uncovered a recurring challenge while consulting for industry giants such as Hilton and Uber. He observed sales teams struggling to manage an overwhelming influx of leads.

Drawing from his expertise, Kleen developed Pitchit, an AI-powered platform that addresses how businesses handle high-volume inbound leads. This solution streamlines the lead qualification process, allowing sales teams to focus their efforts on the most promising opportunities.

They've achieved:

🤖 Qualified 130,000 leads worth $280 million in revenue for customers
💰 Secured $2.5M in seed funding
🚀 Increased customer revenue by 2.5x in one case (T-Mobile dealer)
🌐 Expanding from text-based to voice AI capabilities
🏆 Onboarded a major T-Mobile dealer as their first significant customer
💼Successfully pivoted from multi-channel outreach to inbound lead qualification

Pitchit's success comes from its focus on solving a specific problem for businesses with high inbound lead volume. By automating lead qualification and engagement, Pitchit allows sales teams to concentrate on warm or hot leads, rather than spending time on initial outreach and qualification.

This approach improves lead handling efficiency, as demonstrated by one customer who achieved $4 million in monthly revenue after implementing Pitchit, representing a 2.5-fold increase from their previous results.



How they did it: 

📊 Applied insights from previous tech ventures (Frame Data, Paper Space)
🔍 Identified lead qualification pain points through consulting work
🛠️ Built MVP and pivoted based on market feedback and compliance challenges 🤝 Networked at industry expos to secure initial customers
🎯 Focused on a niche market (telecom dealers) before expanding



Key Highlights:

• AI-powered lead engagement across multiple channels (email, text, WhatsApp, Facebook, Instagram)

• Seamless integration with existing CRM systems like HubSpot and Salesforce

• Raised $2.5M through 130+ investor meetings over an 18-month period

• Pivoted from multi-channel outreach to inbound lead qualification due to compliance issues

• Expanding from text-based to voice AI capabilities

• Achieved success by focusing on a specific niche before expanding

Read more about their journey and watch their video here! 🔥🔥🔥

HEADLINE ROUNDUP
Headline recap

• AMD acquires server maker ZT Systems for $4.9 billion to strengthen AI capabilities and compete with Nvidia. (TC)

• The United States has invested $335 billion in AI over the past decade, tripling China's investment, with 71,000 AI job postings in 2024. (FN)

• The biggest US companies warn of AI risks, as over half of Fortune 500 companies cite it as a potential hazard in annual reports. (FT)

• ElevenLabs has expanded its text-to-speech Reader app to 32 languages, now available internationally. (TC)

• California-based Goodfire AI raises $7M to help AI companies adjust and fine-tune their LLMs. (BW)

• Defcon AI, a Virginia-based startup focused on improving US military logistics with ML, raises a $44M seed round led by Bessemer and secures $15M in government contracts. (TC)

• South Korean AI chip makers Rebellions Inc and Sapeon Korea Inc have agreed to merge, aiming to compete with global giants like Nvidia. (R)

• OpenAI shuts down election influence operations that use ChatGPT. (TC)

• Former carpenter Sarah Buchner raises $20M for Trunk Tools, an AI startup that organizes construction documentation to prevent delays and streamline project management. (TC)

• The AI revolution is driving major changes in data centers, making them essential to meet the growing computational demands of AI technologies. (AIN)

TRENDS
1 AI Trend of the week

Decentralized search engine (DSE)

• Key Players: Presearch, YaCy, Almonit

• Active Users: 3.8M+

• Latest Developments: Integration with blockchain technology

A DSE web search platform operates on a distributed network, spreading tasks across multiple peers without a central server. This structure aims to enhance privacy, reduce centralized data collection, and eliminate single-entity control over search results.

Why it matters: DSE aims to shift information access control from tech giants to users. By distributing the search process across multiple nodes, they potentially reduce the risk of data manipulation, enhance user privacy, and offer alternatives to ad-driven models. This approach could lead to more diverse search results and increased resilience against censorship.

The big picture: This trend represents a broader movement towards decentralized internet infrastructure. It aligns with other efforts to reduce centralized control in technology, such as blockchain and decentralized finance. If successful, decentralized search could challenge the business models of major tech companies, reshape how online information is indexed and accessed, and contribute to a more user-centric digital ecosystem.