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Contextual AI is an AI software company based in Mountain View, California. It develops a platform for building specialized Retrieval-Augmented Generation (RAG) agents for enterprise use.[1] The company was founded in 2023 by Douwe Kiela and Amanpreet Singh, both former AI researchers at Facebook AI Research (FAIR) and Hugging Face.[2]

Contextual AI provides generative AI applications, with deployments primarily in the technology, banking, finance and media sectors.

History

In 2020, while working at Meta, Kiela worked with others to develop retrieval-augmented generation, as a way to improve the performance of large language models (LLMs).

In June 2023, Contextual AI announced[2] it had raised $20 million in a seed funding round led by Bain Capital Ventures (BCV), with participation from Lightspeed Venture Partners, Greycroft, SV Angel, and several angel investors.[1]

In August 2024, the company raised $80 million in a Series A funding round[3] led by Greycroft,[4] with participation from previous investors[5] including Bain Capital Ventures, Lightspeed, and Conviction Partners.[6] The round also included new backers such as Bezos Expeditions, NVentures (Nvidia), HSBC Ventures, and Snowflake Ventures.[7]

In January 2025, Contextual AI announced the general availability of its enterprise platform for building specialized RAG agents.[8] In March 2025, the company introduced a Grounded Language Model (GLM) as way to attempt to improve factual accuracy in enterprise AI applications. [9]

Applications

Contextual AI’s platform has been used in finance, technology, media and professional services.[10][11]

References

  1. ^ a b Wiggers, Kyle (June 7, 2023). “Contextual AI launches from stealth to build enterprise-focused language models”. TechCrunch.
  2. ^ a b Franzen, Carl (June 7, 2023). “Contextual AI emerges from stealth with $20M to pursue ‘artificial specialized intelligence’“. VentureBeat.
  3. ^ Gain, Vish (August 2, 2024). “San Francisco’s Contextual AI raises $80m to scale platform”. Silicon Republic.
  4. ^ Vu, Marcie (August 1, 2024). “Expanding Our Investment in Contextual AI”. Greycroft.
  5. ^ Cai, Kenrick (August 1, 2024). “Contextual AI raises $80 mln for model-enhancing technique”. Reuters.
  6. ^ Fink, Charlie (August 9, 2024). “Contextual AI Raises $80 Million, Judge Calls Google A Monopolist, Bytedance Intros Jimeng Text-To-Video AI”. Forbes.
  7. ^ Deutscher, Maria (August 2, 2024). “Contextual AI nabs $80M for its ‘RAG 2.0’ platform”. SiliconANGLE.
  8. ^ Wheatley, Mike (January 15, 2025). “Contextual AI launches RAG 2.0 platform to aid in the development of domain-specific AI agents”. SiliconANGLE.
  9. ^ Nuñez, Michael (March 4, 2025). “Contextual AI’s new AI model crushes GPT-4o in accuracy — here’s why it matters”. VentureBeat.
  10. ^ “Contextual AI’s Customers”. CB Insights. 2025.
  11. ^ Sullivan, Mark (March 18, 2025). “The most innovative companies in applied AI for 2025”. Fast Company.