- Safiu Kehinde
A Nigerian-born inventor and tech expert, Sam Udotong, has recorded $1 billion valuation with their speech-to-text transcription app, Fireflies.ai.
The United States-based inventor recorded the feat alongside his partner, Krish Ramineni.
This was disclosed in a post shared on X on Friday by the United States Mission in Nigeria.
While celebrating the feat, the US Mission described Udotong’s journey as a reflection of American excellence in technology and entrepreneurship.
According to reports, Fireflies.ai, an AI meeting assistant used by 75% of Fortune 500 companies, enables workers to summarize key information from meetings.
Fireflies’ valuation growth comes from a tender offer rather than a traditional funding round, which provided liquidity to long-term employees.
The company has reportedly remained profitable since 2023 and hasn’t raised primary capital since 2021, despite maintaining triple-digit year-over-year growth.
According to Tech Funding News, the co-founders of the app met while studying at the University of Pennsylvania and later at MIT.
While Udotong has a background in aerospace engineering and computer science, Ramineni, who is originally from India, previously worked at Microsoft before co-founding Fireflies.
Meanwhile, Fireflies valuation reportedly coincided with the launch of “Talk to Fireflies”, an interactive AI meeting companion that users can engage with via voice or chat in over 60 languages across Zoom, Google Meet, and Microsoft Teams.
The co-founders had collaborated with Perplexity for the new app which will enable users to ask questions and receive real-time answers sourced from the internet, all without leaving their meetings.