Brett Crosby

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AdZen Secures Funding to Revolutionize Advertising in Conversational AI We’re excited to announce that we have closed our Seed Funding round, backing our mission to reinvent how advertising works in conversational AI and publishers as well. As LLMs become one of the most important discovery and decision-making surfaces on the internet, the industry faces a fundamental problem: How do AI platforms monetize without breaking trust, degrading user experience, or compromising privacy? At AdZen, we believe advertising must evolve with the medium. We’ve built a content-first, privacy-friendly advertising platform designed specifically for conversations; not banners, not interruptions, but relevant brand engagement that fits naturally inside AI and web experiences. “As people are increasingly turning to LLMs for answers, AI companies need a way to monetize those interactions. Meanwhile, brands need a way to find their customers. We are thrilled to be supported by this badass group of investors who share our vision of restoring balance to the digital ecosystem,” from our CEO and Co-Founder Spencer Bardsley. “This funding will help us accelerate our mission, bringing effective monetization solutions to AI platforms and web publishers worldwide, while continuing to prioritize user trust and experience.” Investors include: - Fiat Ventures @FiatVen - Inventus Capital Partners @Inventusvc - Silicon Valley Quad - Andreessen Horowitz @a16z - New Enterprise Associates @NEA - Bain Capital Ventures @BainCapital We’re especially proud to be supported by investors and operators who helped build the advertising ecosystems at Google, Meta, LinkedIn, Spotify, YouTube, AOL, and more, people who deeply understand both the power and the responsibility of advertising at scale. This funding enables us to: - Accelerate product development for LLM-native advertising - Grow our team across AI, product, and partnerships - Scale a monetization engine that prioritizes relevance, trust, and user experience Advertising has fueled every major technology shift. Conversational AI will be no different; but it demands a fundamentally new model. We’re building it. Reach out to discuss our Advertising Solutions, Publisher Monetization or AI Platform integrations. Additionally, we are actively hiring, so connect with us to learn more about our open positions and how we will help keep LLMs free for everyone to use. Onward.

Ads are coming to AI. But they don’t have to ruin the experience. To quickly catch you up: @OpenAI announced ads are coming to @chatbotgtp . @Anthropic answered with a very public slam in yesterday’s Super Bowl ads. So what’s the path forward? First, what’s been stated publicly is that ads are going to start appearing in ChatGPT. These are image based ads. They appear to be somewhat related to the content of the conversation. They are paid per impression (not click) and Keyword is reporting they will cost $60 per impression, approximately 3x higher than ads on Meta, for example. And starting spend for a campaign is $200K. What OpenAI has made clear is that their ads are not impacting the organic results you are getting from ChatGPT, even though Anthropic’s new ad spots would imply otherwise. This approach is the playbook that we shared with OpenAI and one that we all agree is the right path forward. Read more here. adzen.ai/blog/ads-are-c…

The debate around ads in AI isn't just heating up, it's boiling over. @OpenAI 's move to introduce advertising into ChatGPT was met with a swift industry backlash, humorously highlighted by @AnthropicAI 's upcoming Super Bowl ads that openly ridicule the concept. Our CEO, Spencer Bardsley, asks the question, ”Is the backlash warranted? The most used platforms today are ad supported. TV, social, video, search, mobile. The industry offers paid, ad-free options, but most consumers choose ad-supported models.” Our view at AdZen is that AI is no different. Ad-supported means greater accessibility and often more choices. But let's pause the noise and face a critical historical truth. Every paradigm-shifting technology, every mass-scale platform that has defined the modern digital era, has been powered by one engine: Advertising. Read more here: adzen.ai/blog/the-ai-ad…

Happy 20th anniversary @googleanalytics. We launched you on this day, Nov 14th, 2005. It took a ton of effort and a lot of convincing to get you live. Not too late for a founders award 😘. @impunity @mutzet @weschan @friedberg @pbotto33 @aldendesoto @jeromyhenry @avinash