Meta has acquired AI voice startup WaveForms for an undisclosed amount, according to The Information. The deal marks Meta’s second major AI audio purchase in a month, following its acquisition of Play AI, as the company continues to expand its newly formed Superintelligence Labs division.
WaveForms, founded just eight months ago, had already raised $40 million from Andreessen Horowitz, achieving a $160 million pre-money valuation, according to Pitchbook data. Two of its co-founders, former Meta and OpenAI researcher Alexis Conneau, and former Google advertising strategist Coralie Lemaitre, have joined Meta. Conneau previously co-created the GPT-4o Advanced Voice Mode neural networks while at OpenAI.
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It remains unclear whether the company’s chief technologist, Kartikay Khandelwal, or its roughly 14 other employees will also transition to Meta. WaveForms has taken down its official website, but its LinkedIn profile describes its mission as solving the “Speech Turing Test” determining if listeners can distinguish between human and AI-generated speech and developing “Emotional General Intelligence”, aimed at understanding self-awareness and emotional management in AI.
This acquisition signals Meta’s deepening investment in AI-driven voice technology as it positions itself to compete in the rapidly evolving synthetic speech and conversational AI market.
