The Twenty Minute VC (20VC): Venture Capital | Startup Funding | The Pitch 20VC: ElevenLabs Hits $200M ARR: The Untold Story of Europe's Fastest Growing AI Startup | The Real Cost of AI from Talent to Data Centres | How US VCs are in a Different League to Europeans | The Future of Foundation Models with Mati Staniszewski
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Sep 8, 2025 
Mati Staniszewski, Co-Founder and CEO of ElevenLabs, shares insights from leading one of Europe's fastest-growing AI startups. He discusses hitting $200M ARR in just 10 months, comparing growth strategies with U.S. firms, and retaining top AI talent amidst fierce competition. Mati explains the importance of effective product launches and the challenges of building in-house data centers. The conversation also touches on the future of AI voice technology and the cultural differences that impact European startups. Prepare for a deep dive into the dynamic AI landscape!
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Bad Dubbing Sparked The Company
- The idea began with bad movie dubbing in Poland and a hackathon audio project.
- That pain led Mati and Piotr to build better text-to-speech research and products.
Build Models When Market Quality Lags
- If existing models are poor, invest in building your own specialized models for real differentiation.
- Validate demand concurrently with research by sending samples to potential users.
Multimodality Breaks Plateaus
- Model progress varies by modality; narration quality may plateau while multimodal advances open new capabilities.
- Combining modalities (reasoning+speech) can skip steps and improve experience.