niki.ai

Niki is an artificial intelligence company headquartered in Bangalore, Karnataka. It was founded in May 2015[3] by IIT Kharagpur graduates Sachin Jaiswal, Keshav Prawasi, Shishir Modi and Nitin Babel.

niki.ai
Formerly
zabbed
Founded1 March 2015 (2015-03-01)
Udaipur, India[1]
Founder
  • Sachin Jaiswal
  • Shishir Modi
  • Keshav Prawasi
  • Nitin Babel
Headquarters
Bangalore
,
India
12°56′35″N 77°37′19″E
Number of locations
1 (2018)
Area served
India
Number of employees
50[2] (2018)
Websiteniki.ai

The Niki android app was launched for a limited beta in June, 2015, then released for public during YourStory's TechSparks 2015, and is a Tech30 company. The company raised an undisclosed amount in seed funding[4] from Unilazer Ventures,[5] a Mumbai-based VC firm founded by Ronnie Screwvala, in October 2015. This was followed by another seed funding round by Ratan Tata in May 2016.[6] The company then raised US$2 million in Series A round of funding from SAP.iO, existing investors and some US and Germany-based investors, among others.[7]

Product

The product is an artificial intelligence-powered chatbot which works as an intelligent personal assistant, named Niki. Leveraging natural language processing and machine learning, Niki presents a chat-based[8] natural language user interface to the users where they can interact with Niki in their natural language. Niki understands how users chat in India,[9] deciphers the words, in the context of product/services that they would like to purchase, and comes up with apt recommendations.

Initially it was only available on the Android platform as a mobile app. The company has expanded its operations to the Facebook messenger and Apple iOS platforms[10] and has introduced a better user experience and natural language processing technology.[11] The company aims to soon be present on more messaging platforms like Slack and WhatsApp.

The company currently provides 20+ services to over 2 million consumers, covering a wide spectrum ranging from utility services like mobile recharge, bill payments, travel services like cabs,[12] buses, hotels[13] and entertainment services like movies and events. Services such as flights and healthcare are also planned.

Partnerships

In September 2017, Infosys Finacle joined with Niki.ai to provide chat-based service to banking customers.[14]

In August 2017, Niki partnered with LazyPay to enable a 'buy now, pay later' feature for its users.[15]

References
  1. "About the company". Archived from the original on 6 November 2016. Retrieved 5 November 2016.
  2. "Meet the team". Archived from the original on 6 November 2016. Retrieved 5 November 2016.
  3. "Udaipur-Based Niki Is Smarter Version Of Siri For E-Commerce". 14 July 2015. Retrieved 27 December 2016 – via indianweb2.com.
  4. "Artificial Intelligence Startup Niki.ai Raises Funding From ... - Inc42". Retrieved 26 December 2016 – via Inc42.
  5. "The Rise Of Bots: A Timeline Of Major VC-Backed Bot Startups - CB Insights". Retrieved 2 August 2016 – via CB Insights.
  6. "Chat Bots Charm Ratan Tata, Another AI Startup - Entrepreneur". Retrieved 26 December 2016 – via entrepreneur.com.
  7. "Ratan Tata-backed AI startup Niki.ai raises $2 mn in Series A round". VCCircle. 28 June 2017. Retrieved 10 July 2018.
  8. Leonid, Gorev. "Chat as an App Interface: When to Consider It". Retrieved 11 January 2017.
  9. D'Cunha, Suparna Dutt (4 October 2016). "The AI Startup Wave Is Hitting India And Investors Are Taking Notice". Retrieved 11 January 2017 – via Forbes.
  10. "Niki.ai's new Messenger bot lets you hail cabs and order snacks in India". 25 August 2016. Retrieved 11 January 2017 – via Venturebeat.
  11. Srivastava, Vishal (20 July 2016). "Niki, the AI chatbot that lets you order anything and everything, gets major upgrade with improved design and NLP tech". Retrieved 11 January 2017 – via The Tech Portal.
  12. Velayanikal, Malavika (3 December 2015). "So what if the Internet sucks in India? This AI chatbot gets things done". Retrieved 11 January 2017 – via Tech in Asia.
  13. "Now you can book an OYO room via Niki bot". 5 October 2016. Retrieved 11 January 2017 – via Moneycontrol.com.
  14. "Infosys arm to offer chat-based service to banking customers". The Economic Times. 19 September 2017. Retrieved 27 September 2017.
  15. Vignesh, J. (31 August 2017). "Niki.ai partners with LazyPay to offer 'buy now, pay later' feature". The Economic Times. Retrieved 27 September 2017.
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