YouTube LLC co-founder Chad Hurley has reportedly launched and raised a seed round for a new startup that aims to use artificial intelligence to create short-form videos and scripts.
Dubbed EyeTell Inc., Hurley's new company is working on a service that will use generative AI — the latest version of the technology that can mimic human-created text, speech and images from text or other prompts — to produce the scripts and even videos, The Information reported Monday. EyeTell, which is still operating in stealth mode, isn't developing its own AI model, but is instead testing out ones developed by other companies, according to the report. The Palo Alto startup plans to debut its initial product next year, The Information reported.
Hurley didn't immediately respond to a request for comment.
A-Star Capital led EyeTell's seed round; SV Angel also invested in the round, according to the report. The Information didn't know the size of the round or what the valuation EyeTell's backers assigned it as part of the investment.
Representatives of A-Star and SV Angel didn't immediately respond to requests for comment.
Hurley appears to have been working on EyeTell for about two years. An unknown person or entity based in Palo Alto registered "EyeTell LLC" with the California Secretary of State's Office in June 2021.
This past June, some five days after the registration for EyeTell LLC expired, Brent Hurley — presumably Chad's younger brother, who has the same name — registered EyeTell Inc. with the Secretary of State's Office. Brent Hurley used the same Palo Alto address for EyeTell Inc. that was associated with EyeTell LLC.
Chad Hurley is best known for founding YouTube in 2005 with Steve Chen and Jawed Karim, who had worked with him at PayPal Holdings Inc. Alphabet Inc., then known as Google, acquired the upstart video streaming company the following year for $1.65 billion. Hurley stayed on as YouTube's CEO until 2010.
He soon moved back into the world of startups. In 2011, Hurley and Chen co-founded Avos Systems Inc. as a startup incubator based in San Mateo. Three years later, Hurley spun out MixBit, which had developed a mobile video sharing and collaboration app, from Avos. BlueJeans Network Inc., a videoconferencing service provider, acquired MixBit's engineering resources and other assets in 2018.
That same year, Hurley founded GreenPark Sports Inc., which has developed a kind of real-time social networking app for sports enthusiasts. GreenPark has raised more than $54 million in venture funding to date and was valued at $151 million as part of a round last year, according to PitchBook Data.
EyeTell joins a growing number of startups that are planning to use AI to create scripts. San Francisco-based Writesonic Ltd. and Texas-based Jasper AI Inc. each offer generative AI-based services that can produce scripts based off of prompts. ChatGPT from San Francisco-based OpenAI LLC can do the same.
