🦄 Unicorner Startup of the Week:

Findr

✍️ Notes from the Editors

Today's article is brought to you by Ryse. Invest in this smart home company before it becomes a household name.

And that concludes our TechWeek Takeovers!

We had hundreds of founders, investors, and operators join us this past SF and LA Tech Week for two nights of food, drinks, and meaningful connections. Some moments from our LA TechWeek Takeover:

Many more events to come… stay tuned. If you joined this time around, thanks for sharing your night with us! Otherwise, we’re looking forward to seeing you at future events.

- Ethan and Arek 🦄

Search multiple apps at once

Findr is an application that uses AI to streamline the process of finding information at work. To use Findr, users can first integrate all of their workplace apps, such as Gmail, Google Drive, and Github. Then, they can search through all of those apps at once using AI and search APIs. They can also see a preview of each resource that is surfaced from the search, without actually leaving the Findr application.

🔗 Check it out: usefindr.com

The Smart Home Company to Watch

Best Buy has a knack for picking the up-and-coming tech products that go on to dominate the market. Their early bets on household items like Ring (acquired by Amazon for $1.2B) and Nest (acquired by Google for $3.2B) have a proven record of paying off.

Now Best Buy is lifting the curtain on their latest find, launching RYSE’s SmartShades in over 120 retail stores. RYSE has already hit $9M+ in lifetime revenue with over 60,000 units sold, and the numbers are rising (along with the window shades).

RYSE shareholders have seen their value increase 40% year-over-year, with strong upside remaining as they scale into retail and high-volume B2B channels.

Invest in RYSE at just $1.75/share before it becomes a household name.

This is sponsored content. For sponsorship inquiries, please reply to this email.

💰 Business Model

Findr is available as an app on desktop and mobile devices. It has three tiers of service, including the Pro, Team, and Enterprise Plans. The Pro Plan costs $10 per month and includes services ranging from unlimited universal searches, unlimited chats with results, AI model selection options, and more. The Team Plan includes all of that with admin roles and workplace analytics for $15 per member per month. The Enterprise plan includes everything mentioned, plus self-hosting and white labeling.

📈 Traction and Fundraising

👫 Founders

💼 Opportunities

🔮 Our Analysis

Many AI companies have tried to improve the process of retrieving information and applying it directly to workplace applications; however, they have fallen short. If a given company is able to successfully surface resources, it does so by indexing the user’s information, thus sacrificing the privacy of sensitive information. For many enterprises with large amounts of confidential information, such as trade secrets, investment deals, and legal documents, this is unacceptable. 

That’s where Findr steps. It leverages search APIs to surface resources faster and more efficiently than using keyword searches. Keyword searches may be somewhat effective in retrieving data but fail at understanding the context in which the user is looking for the information. By using AI to power its ranking engine, Findr presents the most relevant and important information to the user first, saving time in a fashion that would not be possible with standard keyword searches. The second goal this accomplishes is privacy. This, in conjunction with  ISO and SOC 2 certification, contributes to Findr’s solid stance on data protection. 

When we think of AI companies, or technology companies in general, successful data protection isn’t exactly something that comes to mind. By implementing these values into its plans, Findr has become a trailblazer that can inspire other up-and-coming companies to do the same.

📚 Further reading

Written by Mihir Patel

Get your news where Silicon Valley gets its news 📰

The best investors need the information that matters, fast.

That’s why a lot of them (including investors from a16z, Bessemer, Founders Fund, and Sequoia) trust this free newsletter.

It’s a five minute-read every morning, and it gives readers the information they need ASAP so they can spend less time scrolling and more time doing.

Subscribe for free

Sponsored content

If you enjoyed today's article, forward this email to a friend!

If you're just seeing this email now, subscribe here.

Made with 💜 by the Unicorner team 🦄