- Clout Kitchen has raised $4.45 million in a seed funding round to develop its AI product
- a16z Speedrun and Peak XV’s Surge led the round
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AI-powered startup Clout Kitchen has raised $4.45 million in a seed funding round led by a16z Speedrun and Peak XV’s Surge.
The funds will go towards bolstering Clout Kitchen’s creator-powered video game product Backseat AI, a “buddy” tool for League of Legends that sees fully voiced AI versions of content creators help players improve their competitive gameplay.
Antler, AppWorks, Founders Launchpad, Hustle Fund and Orvel Ventures also participated in the round, as did angel investors like Crunchyroll co-founder Kun Gao and Yield Guild Games CEO Gabby Dizon.
Learning from AI
Clout Kitchen was formed earlier this year and is led by CEO Justin Gorriceta-Banusing and CBO Marcel Feldkamp.
Gorriceta-Banusing previously founded campus-based video games platform AcadArena, meanwhile Feldkamp brings experience as a professional League of Legends player who competed in the World Championships back in 2013.
The seed round will help fund further workforce expansion at the company.
Clout Kitchen’s first AI-powered product, Backseat AI, was co-developed with popular streamer and League of Legends player Tyler Steinkamp. Known online as “Tyler1”, he has over five million Twitch followers and two million YouTube subscribers.
The service was released in early access this June for further testing and has expanded to include two more AI “buddies” since – streamer Emiru and pro player Jankos. Clout Kitchen pays creators per subscription to their “buddy” version in Backseat AI.
“As a creator myself, I know how difficult it is to keep your community and business growing,” said Feldkamp.
“It’s easy when you’re starting and have all the time in the world – but it gets harder to keep giving the same love to everyone as you scale. We want to solve that problem.”
A16z investment partner Jack Soslow commented on the round: “At a16z, we believe in the transformative power of technology and games to reshape how we connect, create, and experience the world.
“Clout Kitchen embodies this vision wholly, and we are thrilled to support their journey as they pioneer new ways for fans to engage with the creators and games they love.”
