For years, recruiters used machine studying to search out potential hires by looking for key phrases in résumés and LinkedIn profiles. Though this methodology helps to slim the candidate pool, recruiters nonetheless must manually assessment every profile to find out the perfect match for the job.

David Paffenholz (pictured left) and Ishan Gupta, then simply 22 and 19, respectively, realized that LLMs may discover expertise sooner and extra effectively. They constructed Juicebox, an AI-powered search engine that makes use of pure language to research skilled profiles, private web sites, and different publicly accessible info to determine essentially the most certified candidates.

After attending startup accelerator Y Combinator in the summertime of 2022, Paffenholz and Gupta spent a pair extra years refining their product. When their AI search engine, PeopleGPT, was prepared in late 2023, it was rapidly adopted by a variety of shoppers, from small startups to massive corporations like Cognition, Ramp, and Perplexity.

In a brief time frame, it was serving over 2,500 prospects and attaining greater than $10 million in annual recurring income (ARR).

On Thursday, Juicebox introduced that it had raised $36 million in complete funding, together with a $30 million Collection A spherical led by Sequoia.

Sequoia accomplice David Cahn realized concerning the firm whereas catching up with an early-stage startup founder who mentioned that he’s utilizing Juicebox for all of his recruiting efforts. Cahn informed TechCrunch that the founder has employed over a dozen folks with out utilizing knowledgeable recruiter, one thing that was beforehand very tough to do.

Such a rave assessment of Juicebox piqued Cahn’s curiosity. Shortly after, Cahn realized that Sequoia’s inside recruiter was additionally attempting Juicebox to assist the agency with its personal hiring efforts, which made him much more excited concerning the startup’s progress potential.  

When Cahn ultimately met with Paffenholz and Gupta, he was much more impressed.

“I’m undecided I’ve ever in my profession seen an organization with 4 those that bought to 2,000 prospects with that small of a group,” Cahn informed TechCrunch.

Though Juicebox has since employed eight further workers, the corporate continues to draw prospects with out a gross sales group.

Clients are flocking to Juicebox partially as a result of hiring pace is extraordinarily necessary for corporations racing to construct AI functionalities.

What units Juicebox’s search engine aside is its skill to deduce details about candidates very like a human would.

“We assist discover internet new candidates that wouldn’t be discovered elsewhere, as a result of the profiles may not have the key phrases or the kinds of issues that we’d count on them to have within the common searches,” Paffenholz informed TechCrunch.

The startup’s product is well-liked not solely with small corporations that lack a devoted recruiter, but additionally with expertise groups at massive firms. By automating the candidate search, the device frees up inside recruiters to focus extra on constructing relationships with potential hires.

As soon as Juicebox identifies candidates, its agent can mechanically e-mail them and schedule preliminary calls.

Whereas Juicebox is rising rapidly, older expertise acquisition startups like Eightfold are additionally including AI-powered search performance to their choices.

Nonetheless, Cahn is satisfied that Paffenholz and Gupta can remodel Juicebox into an important product for each startup’s know-how stack.

“We’ve invested in plenty of companies that develop into defaults for startups, like Stripe,” he mentioned. “I believe Juicebox has an opportunity to be a default the place, each single startup, [it’s] the very first thing they use to rent their first workers.”