Wondercraft raises $3m to build AI-powered ‘Canva of Audio’

AI audio content pioneer Wondercraft has raised a $3m Seed round to scale its ‘Canva of audio’ platform in a round led by Will Ventures and backed by Y Combinator, ElevenLabs, Steven Bartlett and other Angels. The technology enables anyone to create studio-quality audio productions - whether it’s for podcasts, ads, audiobooks, meditations or training materials - in any language, by simply typing.

Wondercraft was founded by Palantir engineers Dimitris Nikolaou and Youssef Rizk, and Oskar Serrander, former COO at Acast and executive at Spotify and iHeartmedia. Bringing together creator industry experience with engineering expertise, the founding team’s passion for audio storytelling and technology set them on a mission to make audio part of every creator and brand’s toolkit.

Wondercraft users can add professional audio to a huge range of creative projects, with templates ready to transform blogs into podcasts, articles into audiobooks, and advertising copy into marketing campaigns. The Wondercraft tools and templates offer custom AI script assistants, professional music, video generation and ultra-realistic AI voices to help users create great-sounding listening experiences. With no need for a studio, mics, mixing equipment or editing software, studio-quality audio can be created in minutes and at a fraction of the traditional cost.

The platform also offers a tool to seamlessly translate and dub new or existing projects into 15+ languages using AI and supported by a team of 100+ language experts who edit, validate and quality assure each translation. This hybrid approach delivers the precision of human translation with the speed and cost-effectiveness of AI.

Dimitris Nikolaou, co-founder, comments: “Canva made everyone a designer – we want to empower everyone to be an audio creator. Audio is an integral part of people’s media habits today, yet many gifted storytellers are held back by limited tools, production resources and translation services. The incredible breakthrough in human-like synthetic voices, pioneered by our partners at ElevenLabs, was the catalyst for us to pursue our vision of a creative platform dedicated to audio.”

Oskar Serrander, co-founder, adds: “With Wondercraft, we are making professional audio more approachable. Not only is this great for the growing number of independent creators out there, but also for large media publishers looking to scale their content production and for advertising businesses searching for better tools. For the first time, we are also making translations and professional dubbing affordable and efficient so content producers can finally expand into new languages; building new fanbases and revenue. We are dedicated to leveraging AI thoughtfully and ethically to empower both well-established and brand new voices to be heard across borders.”

After launching in beta in 2023, the company has already been embraced by over 30,000 creators, writers, entrepreneurs, advertisers and brands. The Wondercraft technology is also powering dozens of the biggest titles in podcasting, including Diary of A CEO and CoinDesk podcasts network.

Steven Bartlett, host of Diary of A CEO, comments: “Wondercraft has given us tools that have enabled us to reach new global audiences in new languages. I believe their product is the future of audio production for creators and publishers so I couldn’t be more excited to be on board.”

Jared Schwartz, Executive Producer, Coindesk: “Wondercraft has been a great addition to our workflow at CoinDesk Podcasts. We’ve been able to integrate the technology into our shows for a more efficient process without sacrificing quality. With our growth strategy to build out the CoinDesk Podcast Network, I see Wondercraft as an important partner in leveraging the very best in AI Voice for our needs.”

Following initial funding from Y Combinator, this round was led by Will Ventures and joined by voice research lab ElevenLabs and host of the Diary of A CEO podcast Steven Bartlett. The investment will be used to further build out the capabilities of the platform and expand the features available to Wondercraft’s users.