There are a lot of resources out there for learning English, but not enough for native speakers who still want to improve their fluency. This description applies to Stan Beliaev and Yurii Rebryk, and it’s what inspired them to create Fluently.
Fluently acts as a coach that uses AI to provide users with feedback and tips on speaking English. It is similar to ELSA and AI voice tutors, online and offline one-on-one coaching solutions, but the difference is that Fluently builds feedback through phone listening.
Users can record and transcribe real calls fluently, for example, while using Zoom for work. But there is also the option to practice with an AI coach, either “Ryan” for daily chit-chat or “Kyle” for mock interviews, which are often a priority for foreign applicants seeking jobs that require advanced English speaking skills, as is increasingly the case.
Scratching that itch, the duo estimates that there are 84 million non-native employees working in English-speaking environments. It's hard to say how many of these would like to be more easily understood, but it's a big enough niche, a growing niche, and a much less crowded space overall than ESL.
This potential market helped Fluently participate in Y Combinator’s Winter 2024 batch and close a $2 million seed round with participation from Pioneer Fund, SID Venture Partners, and individual angels even before Demo Day.
It didn't hurt that Fluently relies heavily on the technical side of educational technology. Rebryk told TechCrunch that of the distributed team of four, three are engineers. With a shared background in machine learning, he and his former college roommate have the kind of resume that excites VCs these days, with internships at Amazon, Google, and Nvidia.
The fact that none of them are teachers, let alone experts in pedagogy, may raise eyebrows. But creating the products they need themselves gives them an edge. For example, they know that people who are already fairly fluent speakers are more interested in solutions available in the background and only call attention to problems that need solving.
Another point is that Fluently wants to be a one-stop shop for better speaking skills. The goal is understandability rather than accent, which includes improving pronunciation, grammar, and speed, as well as expanding your vocabulary. Rebryk said that another addition could be wording advice, similar to what Grammarly or Ludwig offer for writing.
In its current beta form, Fluently is still in its early stages and isn’t immune to crashes. But for those who don’t mind sharing their credit card information to try out the free trial, it already offers a strong sense of what it can accomplish. For example, I’ve learned how to pronounce “computer” better, which could be incredibly useful if you work in tech. For some, at least, that could be worth the $25 per month Fluently plans to charge.
There are still pages that Fluently can pull from Duolingo to help users correct mistakes and track their progress in a gamified way. This is generally key to helping people stick to their goals, and motivation to learn a language tends to ebb and flow. However, rather than learning in a holistic way, the idea is to focus on a user’s specific struggles, leveraging technology to move from near fluency to complete proficiency.
One concern with personalization can be privacy, especially for apps that run in the background and have access to the microphone. For this reason, Fluently insists that users are told during onboarding that their privacy is protected, that audio is stored locally and encrypted, and that data is protected from third-party providers. Regarding the latter, the startup notes that “data sent to third-party AI providers is anonymized and not used for training.”
According to Rebryk, some of this was made possible by the recent launch of Apple Silicon. This has to do with another limitation of the beta version: it’s only available on macOS. However, Fluently is already building a waiting list of users who will be notified when the Chrome extension is ready.
With that in mind, the seed round will help Fluently hire other team members and free up cash to spend on marketing when the time is right, Rebryk said. “When you’re a small team, you have to prioritize what to do first,” he said with a laugh.
