Otter.ai raises $320 million from General Catalyst's CVF

Otter.ai has been around for nearly a decade and had raised $50 million in total funding before this deal, with its last round in 2021 according to PitchBook data. The new $320 million from General Catalyst's Customer Value Fund is therefore a step change in scale, and its structure differs from a typical venture round: CVF provides capital without diluting equity and earns returns on the results of marketing spend.

On the business side, Otter crossed $100 million in annual recurring revenue last year and said it is now approaching new milestones without providing updated figures. It also said 40 million users have used its product to date, up from 25 million last year. The company did not disclose monthly active users or churn, leaving open the question of how well it retains customers in a crowded field that includes Fireflies.ai, Granola, and Read AI, as well as newer entrants such as Calendly, Wispr, and Superhuman, which acquired Fathom.

Otter is pushing toward connecting to enterprise systems and automating workflows from meeting data. In recent years it introduced a meeting assistant, a search function that works across apps, and integration with other AI tools. It is now experimenting with insights before, after, and during meetings, including a pre-brief feature and a Live Assist feature for asking the AI assistant questions during a meeting. Pranav Singhvi, Partner and Co-founder of CVF at General Catalyst, said voice is one of the biggest untapped opportunities in enterprise AI and that Otter is at the forefront of it.