The streaming wars may have started with Netflix vs. Blockbuster, but the next battle is happening in ad land, and Upscale AI just walked in with a $5.5M war chest and a swagger that says, “We’re not here to play cute.” This isn’t your dad’s adtech platform. This is AI-native, streaming first, DTC killer precision marketing. A bold congrats to founders Herman Yang (ex-Google, Twitter, Moloco) and Kevin Weatherman (Ogury, OneSignal, Twitter) for bringing this rocket out of stealth and into orbit. Seed funded by the likes of nvp capital, M12, Microsoft's Venture Fund, Eniac Ventures, Breakpoint Capital, and SuperAngel.Fund, Upscale AI is showing up exactly where TV meets performance, and where performance has been begging for a seat at the table.
What’s the pitch? Simple. You feed the beast your brand’s digital soul, website, social, Shopify, and Upscale Studio spits out streaming-ready video ads with the kind of flair that used to take $10K and a small army. Now? Try $500 and a turnaround time shorter than most pitch decks. We’re talking 95% cost savings, 85% faster campaign launches, and a ROAS that makes traditional TV look like a relic from the cable box era. Early believers like Branch Furniture + Design, Lalo, and fatty15 aren’t just running ads, they’re seeing 4X returns on spend. That’s not optimization. That’s domination.
This isn’t hype. It’s architecture. Whisper powers the voice. Gemini analyzes your brand style. ElevenLabs handles the voice cloning. The system ingests your content, builds scenes, edits, bids programmatically across 12 major CTV platforms, and optimizes in real-time using machine learning. We’re talking about neural rendering, dynamic creative based on inventory, and cross-platform attribution, all wrapped in a compliance bow with SOC2TypeII and GDPR / CCPA baked in. Clean, sharp, and enterprise ready.
Streaming has officially overtaken social in daily watch time, 3 hours and 9 minutes to be exact. And while most brands are still figuring out how to not look awkward on TikTok, Upscale AI is letting them own the living room. With an eye toward a $30B market, this platform is positioned as the first true end-to-end creative-performance solution for the CTV era. This isn’t a pivot. It’s a homecoming for a medium that was always meant to convert, not just entertain.
When the next era of advertising is written, it won’t be about who had the flashiest brand campaign. It’ll be about who figured out how to make TV work like paid social, at scale, with intent, and without the fluff. Upscale AI didn’t just see the shift. They engineered the gear.
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