With AI artificial intelligence seemingly taking the world by storm, why not have a lottery ticket in this space via investment in a startup that could 1000x in as little as 10 years time? In this blog I feature a new startup slated to launch in Q1 2024, AI Box. Led by Jaeden Schafer, AI Box aims to be the leading marketplace and builder for apps without needing to write any code. Imagine being able to build apps, AI based or in general, and being able to do so without being a developer. So, the average joe could be able to build an app. This is like AI for noobs. Best of all, to be then be paid royalties when other subscribers on the platform use their tools built on the platform, whether apps or any other components of an app. In a paid subscription-based marketplace for users to use the tools and make money via royalty payments, AI Box aims to be the #1 ecosystem-based marketplace for making AI tools accessible and easy to use for anyone.
AI Box is current raising on republic until Feb 28, 2024, with the first $250,000 USD for a valuation of $8.5m, and the remainder up to $1.235m at a $10m valuation cap:
https://republic.com/ai-box?_auth_rf=1699503421#
Founder
Listening to and watching interviews of Jaeden Schafer, he seems to be quite the intelligent young man. My impression was he seemed like a hardworking genius. His views on AI are actually controversial, authentic and candid. He believes a lot of AI are built on models that are manipulative and are built on these negative foundations. Harmful ideologies are often built into these AI commands. For example, validating animal life over human life, even if all humans should die. So, the ethical implications in the baseline foundational assumptions that the AI runs on could be the key to AI. Overall, he is very bullish on AI and thinks it will automate many jobs in all aspects of the economy, particularly jobs that people don’t want to do or that are risky to health. He used AI to help come out with his podcast questions, scripts, and topics. He mentions too that the risk of AI is that it can make people become more mentally lazy by relying entirely on technology rather than thinking for themselves. His demeanour was that of a young passionate person, speaking very quickly and having far too much to say. This shows his excitement and interest in the topic of AI. Imagine if these interviews Jaedan just gave one- or two-word answers; that would not be someone who seems engaged or that I would invest in. He used AI to publish over 3000 articles and with his marketing background, SEO on those articles. Website traffic went from 1000 monthly users on google search and after that, the website traffic ended up growing to 20,000 monthly users. Podcasts can even be voiced and written by AI, by ChatGPT for example. No wonder Jaeden is bullish on AI. They are literally wiping out humans in writing, blogging, marketing, and even podcasts. Many systematic non human jobs will be gone entirely.
His personality, intelligence, demeanour reminded me of Vitalik Buterin, the founder of Ethereum, the 2nd largest cryptocurrency in the world. I am not saying he will end up having that level of success, but there were striking parallels., I also asked Jaeden on the republic forum what his commitment level to AI Box was. As he said he is in it for the long haul for it to become a massive success, that combined with endless ideas and a fountain of energy, seems primed for eventual success.
Previous track record
It’s always good to be looking for someone unusual with strong strengths, the strategy that Sequoia Capital likes to take. After graduating university, he then taught at universities in advanced digital marketing. Jaeden also worked for 4 years on the Self pause app cofounded with his wife Jillian Schafer, an AI based coaching and self-help phone app. It boasts 120k users and is growing. I downloaded the app on my smartphone to test and see how it was during the 7 day free trial. After that, and the annual membership costs $59.99 USD per year, no shorter duration options available. It’s available to download on both i0S and Android. I profess I am not into the self help category so as a result my view is skewed. The app design is simple, intuitive, and easy to use. The app contains options from reaffirmations read out loud, ability to record own voice and save reaffirmations, meditation music, other genres of music designed to help calm the mind. It also has AI chats available for mindset coaching, including goals, affirmation, changing limiting beliefs, mindset coaching, anxiety, and more. It’s library contains any topics ranging from sleep, relationships, entrepreneurship, confidence, money, personal growth, pregnancy, happiness, self-love, mental wellness, school, work, and more. It does the job, albeit unspectacularly.
The big draw for me was Jaeden’s podcast on AI, AI chat. It is an amazing podcast with:
-over 1m views on apple podcasts
-over 533 episodes and counting
-top 10 in business news podcast
-100,000 monthly active listeners
-#1 in AI category
That means Jaeden was committed to AI even before starting the company, interviewing many famous people that many listeners wondered how he was able to get onto his said podcast. With this kind of network in place, it figures to give him the drivers seat in getting AI Box to a big success.
Financials
As AI Box is a startup that has yet to even start, there are absolutely no numbers or financials to make any type of comparisons or conclusions on. No revenue, nothing at all on the balance sheet, income statement, or statement of cashflows. Such is the life of investing into startups.
When I asked the founder Jaeden how he plans to monetize the app, a $3.3 million revenue target was projected in the first year of operations. His response in getting to this figure:
“we’re banking on a tiered subscription model that caters to a wide range of users, from individuals to large enterprises. Our subscription tiers will start as low as $15/month for the most basic access, scaling up to over $2,000/month for the most comprehensive enterprise solutions.
The pricing of subscriptions will be usage-based, considering the varying costs of different AI APIs and models that apps will utilize. For example, a small business using basic app functionalities will pay less compared to a large corporation that requires extensive use of advanced AI features.
We’re expecting an average monthly spend of $78 per premium user, drawing a parallel to the revenue models and customer spending seen in other successful AI tool platforms like Jasper. This strategy balances accessibility for lower-tier users while capturing significant value from high-usage customers, which will be integral to achieving our revenue mix and projections.”
AI Box currently has 2.5k corporations and professionals on the AI Box waitlist, and 3.5k members in the AI Box creators group. They aren’t going to start with nothing.
Competition
Evidently, in any new field where people are running in desperately to shovel for gold, there is going to be a lot of competition. When asked about competition, here is the answer coming straight from the horse’s mouth Jaedan Schafer:
“Having a competitive environment is a strong indicator of a thriving market with substantial demand, which is a positive sign for any business idea.
That being said, Poe’s platform is a chatbot-centric marketplace, not an encompassing tool and app store.
OpenAI’s GPT Store, while it is a marketplace of sorts, is primarily focused on chatbots and more importantly is limited to OpenAI’s ecosystem; our platform, in contrast, will integrate thousands of custom models, effectively combining major players who independently don’t like to work together Google Bard, X.ai, Anthropic etc. onto one universal platform.
YouAI is designed by coders and is overly complex catering more towards developers.
What sets us apart is that we are designing our system to be straightforward and user-friendly, for those without coding expertise (I am the target audience).
Our commitment is to simplicity and accessibility, building a platform with thousands of models by companies who otherwise operate in silos.”
If AI Box can succeed, it won’t matter who or what the competition is.
Investment potential return
At the start of this blog, I mentioned that this investment could yield a 1000x return in 10 years. The reason being a comparable unicorn: Microsoft acquired GitHub in 2018 for $7.5 billion USD. It was founded originally 10 years prior in 2008. GitHub is a platform and cloud-based service for developers to store, manage and share code. AI Box would seem to be doing something similar, except for non-code users. A no code app creator, and marketplace option, it’s like GitHub for noobs with a monetization option. The best-case scenario AI Box could end up being worth $8.5 billion USD in 10-15 years, which would be comparable in market cap and 1000x the current valuation of $8.5 million USD for the first $250,000 USD invested.
Investing pre revenue right now offers maximum reward and risk. Waiting until later raising rounds for proof of concept and sustained annual recurring revenue is also a viable strategy. Unless you are already rich, putting too much in to the first public round seems too risky, particularly at this effectively seed stage. At the same time, having a little exposure to AI in your portfolio, despite the massive competition and lack of proof of concept, could be potential goldmine a decade later.
Disclaimer
This is not Financial Advice. This article is meant only for educational and perhaps entertainment purposes.
Disclosure
I/we have a beneficial long position in the shares of AI Box either through SAFEs, stock ownership, options, or other derivatives. I wrote this article myself, and it expresses my own opinions. I am not receiving compensation for it from AI Box. I have no business relationship with any company who is mentioned in this article.