AI agents for e-commerce startup, founded by Google and DeepMind alums, raises $10M seed | TechCrunch

AI is converting how we store on-line, making our reviews extra personalised. Good assistants suggest merchandise, negotiate offers, or even care for customer support. Large shops and smaller companies are the usage of AI to beef up seek, provide chains, and checkout. 

If AI corporations (and their traders) have their method, buying groceries will quickly be fascinated by talking to an assistant, with companies automating the entirety at the back of the scenes.

Dubai-based Qeen.ai (stylized as qeen.ai) is operating to make this a fact within the Center East and past. The startup has raised $10 million to scale its platform, which supplies self reliant AI brokers for e-commerce companies.

Prosus Ventures, a significant e-commerce investor, led the seed spherical, which isn’t most effective some of the greatest within the Center East’s AI business however in MENA total. The VC believes Qeen.ai is well-positioned to deliver AI-driven automation to traders as AI brokers reshape on-line marketplaces.

Founders Morteza Ibrahimi (CEO), Ahmad Khwlieh (CTO), and Dina Alsamhan (CBO) began Qeen after years of running on AI at Google and DeepMind. 

Ibrahimi, in an interview with techmim, stated that they honed in on e-commerce partially opportunistically: all 3 had labored at Google Advertisements in more than a few roles all through their time with the hunt massive, and so they noticed first-hand how different alums constructed extremely a hit e-commerce companies. On best in their AI experience, the trio knew the way to run advertisements and optimize search engine optimization exceptionally properly and idea it is usually a robust aggregate.

Google and DeepMind background

E-commerce has been ceaselessly rising for years, however with the exception of positive spikes (in particular all through vacation classes) it nonetheless accounts for between 15% and 20% of retail gross sales (even in a mature marketplace just like the U.S. it used to be most effective simply over 16% at of the ultimate quarter, consistent with the U.S. Census Bureau).

Qeen’s thesis is that this may develop if the e-commerce processes have been run higher. Luck in e-commerce, they believed, must be about nice merchandise and operational potency — now not simply who can sport the advert machine very best. That perception led them to construct a platform that is helping e-commerce dealers develop with out depending on advertisements as their number one motive force.

The worldwide e-commerce marketplace is increasing rapid, pushed via converting client conduct, virtual bills, and higher logistics. In MENA, the marketplace is anticipated to hit $50 billion via 2025, with Saudi Arabia and the UAE main the expansion.

Qeen.ai is tapping into this growth via creating AI-powered advertising brokers designed for e-commerce companies throughout MENA. Those absolutely computerized brokers care for content material introduction, advertising, and conversational gross sales, permitting small and mid-sized traders to compete with out depending on dear businesses or deep advert experience.

In contrast to conventional answers, Qeen’s AI often learns from client interactions the usage of its proprietary RL-UI generation, refining advertising methods in real-time for higher effects.

From Google advertisements to AI-driven e-commerce

Whilst AI-powered gross sales and customer support gear ceaselessly fight with top churn charges, as companies continuously transfer platforms, Qeen.ai claims to peer more potent retention in e-commerce and advertising. Ibrahimi attributes this to how deeply Qeen’s AI brokers combine into traders’ workflows, making them a core a part of day by day operations relatively than a replaceable instrument.

A key function using engagement is dynamic textual content personalization, which adjusts content material in keeping with consumer conduct and software sort. For instance, an iPhone consumer may see product main points in bullet issues for speedy studying, whilst a computer consumer will get an in depth paragraph.

Since launching its Dynamic Content material agent in Q2 2024, Qeen.ai has served over 15 million customers, generated 1 million SKU descriptions, and helped traders build up gross sales via 30%, consistent with the corporate.

“We labored with a consumer to optimize their content material and search engine optimization. After the usage of our AI plugins, their seek quantity larger via 40%, and their Google score advanced from 22 to 18—all with 0 guide effort. All the procedure used to be absolutely self reliant,” stated Ibrahimi, giving some other example the place Qeen’s AI features have shone. 

Qeen employs a subscription-based pricing fashion and contains value-based pricing, a rising pattern in AI services and products. Lately, Qeen generates income thru two subscription fashions: content material automation, the place companies pay consistent with energetic SKU, usually $0.10 to $0.20 consistent with SKU monthly. Then its AI advertising agent whose pricing is in keeping with per-interaction quantity. 

Ibrahimi declined to reveal the choice of companies the usage of Qeen, in addition to income expansion metrics. Notable purchasers come with Dubai Retailer, sixth Side road, and Jumia.

Status out… with skill

Ibrahimi left DeepMind in early 2023 to co-found the startup. That very same yr, the corporate raised a $2 million pre-seed spherical sooner than launching its product in June 2024. With its contemporary $10 million seed spherical, qeen has raised a complete of $12 million in underneath a yr.

Throughout this time, AI-powered advertising brokers have won traction international, with a number of startups, in particular within the U.S. and Europe, getting into the gap. Competition like YC-backed Abnormal and Rankai are tackling identical demanding situations, so how does Qeen stand out?

Neatly, for one, all these AI startups center of attention on evolved markets, whilst Qeen as an alternative is prioritizing the Center East first—a area in large part underserved via AI-driven advertising automation gear. In keeping with Ibrahimi, Qeen will serve small companies throughout MENA, determine a robust foothold, after which enlarge globally.

Deep tech experience and a powerful skill pool give Qeen an edge over new entrants, the manager govt added. Two of its co-founders earned PhDs in AI over a decade in the past, lengthy sooner than AI was mainstream. Ibrahimi himself prior to now led a DeepMind analysis staff that specialize in self-learning, goal-driven AI brokers—the similar generation that now powers Qeen.

“Some of the thrilling issues we’ve noticed is the standard of AI skill right here,” Ibrahimi stated. “We’ve attracted nice skill each in the neighborhood and the world over—other folks have left the Bay House, Europe, and the United Kingdom to return right here and construct with us.”

Qeen.ai recently employs over 25 other folks around the UAE and Jordan.

The seed investment will toughen qeen’s expansion technique via increasing its AI platform, scaling its staff, and attracting extra shoppers, it stated. Wamda Capital, 10X Founders Fund, and Dara Holdings are a number of the different traders on this spherical.