AI voice agents are quietly replacing humans in call centers. What that actually looks like, from a founder who raised $80M

Caught a conversation with a founder who recently raised a sizeable round. His company builds AI voice agents for large consumer brands. He’s been in the space for years and just raised over $80 million, so he has some strong opinions on where voice AI is going.

Here’s a takeaway worth sharing:

1. Voice AI used to be a downgrade. Now it’s outperforming humans Most companies used to treat voice bots as a way to cut costs. They were slower, clunkier, and less reliable than human agents. That’s changed in the last year or so.

This founder said AI agents now perform just as well, sometimes better, than humans in many contact center use cases. And they cost about a tenth as much.

What’s even more surprising is that phone calls still outperform other channels. Around 30% of people answer the phone. Only 2% click on emails. Customers who call also tend to have a higher lifetime value.

Would love to hear if anyone else is seeing voice AI show up in support or sales. Is it working in the wild, or still too early in most cases?