Clinc, a Pioneer in Conversational AI

The scientific field of artificial intelligence is rapidly growing with new technology created and its use expanding into every industry on the list. As AI developers across the globe continue to see consistent breakthroughs with deepened, more specific research and improved understanding, artificial intelligence and its various forms of human-replicating technology have no other choice but to effortlessly weave its way into more and more aspects of our daily lives. 

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Clinc, the Ann Arbor-based A.I. startup, is expanding the applications of conversational artificial intelligence across the financial sector, not only in the United States but over the world. Clinc’s ‘human-in-the-room’ virtual assistant experience will revolutionize the ease with which banks communicate with their customers. It guarantees your consumer banking experience remains seamless, if not more easily maneuverable with Clinc’s conversational AI technology at your assistance.

Clinc Beginnings

Clinc is a conversational AI research company founded in 2015.  The original concept for the conversational AI company was born out of a University of Michigan classroom project built on the hypothesis that there were the capabilities of creating a different kind of AI that would reduce company costs and time in the design and deployment phase while, at the same time, offering the most naturally conversational virtual assistant experience possible. 

In five short years, Clinc has become the most advanced conversational AI technology on the market, seen several deployments with major financial institutions all over the world, gathered an insane amount of private funding to continue their research while scaling for multiple verticals, and was named one of the top twenty-five AI companies to watch in Forbes magazine. 

Clinc’s main goal from the beginning was to discover and create innovative and effective ways to use artificial intelligence to solve common problems in daily life. 

The Fearless Leadership of Clinc AI

Since September of 2020, Clinc’s executive suite has seen a refreshment of mammoth proportions. New CEO Jon Newhard was first welcomed to the ranks in July 2020. Newhard, a 25-year veteran CEO in the tech space, had the tall order of filling out the rest of Clinc‘s vacant executive seats.

Newhard brought on a 20-year marketing executive and industry leader in new Chief Marketing Officer John Lichtenberg. He also plucked Chief Customer Officer Mahesh Baxi from the entreprenuerial life to head up the outreach to find new partnerships in financial services across the world.

Ray Hale serves as Clinc’s CFO with twenty years of experience scaling emerging technology companies and positioning them for success. Chief Information Officer Dr. Yunqi Zhang designed, developed, and deployed large-scale software systems in production with Microsoft and Facebook. He received his Masters in Computer Science in Ann Arbor at the University of Michigan.

In very recent and exciting news, Clinc has just appointed Mr. Jon Newhard as the conversational AI company’s new Chief Executive Officer. Mr. Newhard joins the Clinc family with 25 years of experience in Information Technology running enterprise software businesses largely in private equity and VC environments. 

Clinc and Ann Arbor, Michigan

Clinc headquarters in Ann Arbor, Michigan, and the company’s executives plan to remain in the area that they have called home since the inception of the company. University of Michigan is one of the top schools in the country for computer engineering, and Ann Arbor has always served as a great location for emerging and successful technology startups. Beyond Ann Arbor, Clinc has a satellite office in Beijing China.

Clinc’s Innovative Technology

Clinc first created Finie, the voice-operated AI virtual assistant designed specifically for the banking and financial services industry. Finie was built with an intricate and vast financial services vocabulary and knowledge-base. Banking customers can speak with the AI virtual assistant in everyday, natural language, and Finie understands and processes all requests. Finie will even take into account the time of day and year, along with other current external forces to speak to each customer as if there was absolutely nothing virtual about Finie at all. Clinc’s cutting-edge conversational technology puts Finie on par with any real-life banking customer service specialist who is ready to take care of any and all of your banking requests.

Finie can check bank statements, activate new cards, make payments and transfers, locate ATMs, and even contact tech support in the slim chance that service beyond Finie’s reach is needed. Clinc’s AI virtual assistant will also recommend personalized ways to save money based on a user’s transaction history. This industry-leading conversational AI technology can be programmed in over 80 various languages.

Finie even understands messy language, complex conversations, and conversational healing. Clinc’s technology uses machine learning, so every new query makes the AI smarter and more capable of successfully servicing the banking institution’s client base at 360 degrees. Clinc developers built five different AI engines from scratch to fully construct Finie.

A host of prominent banking institutions currently utilize Clinc’s technology, including İşbank of Turkey. The product has a user-friendly platform, so businesses can easily build and launch an AI model quickly through one centralized portal. The platform includes automated testing suites and sends notifications when there are errors.

Clinc won the 2019 Technology Leadership Award for Artificial Intelligence from Frost & Sullivan. This award is given to companies that show innovation and uniqueness in their tech solutions.

Finie is currently the only AI virtual assistant technology solution that is deployed to over 35 million users across the globe.

Clinc AI Funding

Since 2015, Clinc has successfully raised funds for its research and development ventures from a variety of sources. They received a $225,000 grant from the National Science Foundation, and they received $1.2 million in seed funding from various private investors.

In 2019, the company raised $52 million Series B to fund future AI development projects in several verticals beyond banking and financial services. This funding came from DFJ Growth, Drive Capital, Hyde Park Venture Partners, Insight Partners, and several other firms. Clinc’s investors are located all across the United States. 

The Future of Clinc AI

Clinc has been growing steadily since its incarnation in 2015, and this conversational AI pioneer will only continue to broaden and better its technology as well as the verticals in which they deploy their AI virtual assistants. Clinc is currently focusing its efforts in the financial sector in hopes of becoming the leading conversational AI technology internationally for the banking and financial services sector, but Clinc’s new leadership has its eyes on a much bigger tomorrow. They plan to expand their technology services to service multiple verticals; able to take on an even more diverse client base in the future.

Clinc has a little less than 100 employees and is currently adding to its roster in many different departments. Clinc still calls Ann Arbor, MI home, but there are many opportunities for both seasoned tech professionals and young innovators throughout the country to join the team.

Conversational AI is a burgeoning wave at the forefront of AI technology’s future. Language capabilities are an excellent example of how this conversational AI technology can simplify, and evolve at the very same time. Clinc’s innovative and industry-leading natural language-creating technology can answer every single one of your questions and quickly take any undue stress out of people’s daily tasks like going to the bank. As conversational AI grows in popularity and in practice across new verticals and across the world, you can safely bet that Clinc will be innovating and leading the charge each and every time.

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‘Building the most intelligent technology to enhance human capabilities.’

Clinc