Full-Stack Engineer - Back-End Leaning

Karnataka signs MoU with ElevenLabs to develop Voice AI for public services and voice restoration. The Karnataka Innovation and Technology Society (KITS), under the Department of Electronics, Information Technology and Biotechnology, Government of Karnataka, has signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with global Voice AI company ElevenLabs Inc. to explore applications of Voice AI for responsible use, citizen services and social benefits. The collaboration will concentrate on three areas: creating a Voice AI safety framework, employing AI-based voice restoration to assist individuals who have lost their speech, and enhancing accessibility to government services through Voice AI technologies. Stay connected Make The News Mill your preferred source See more TNM stories when you search for news on Google. Karnataka Home Minister Priyank Kharge commented, "AI must ultimately be measured by the change it brings to people's lives. Voice AI offers an opportunity to make government more accessible and citizen-centric. But with it comes new responsibilities like safety, consent, trust and prevention of misuse." He added, "Through this partnership with ElevenLabs, Karnataka has the opportunity to work on both dimensions - to formulate strong safety measures to use Voice AI responsibly, as well as explore uses that provide solutions to real challenges faced by our citizens." "The possibility of helping those who have lost their ability to speak to communicate again in their own voice is a most effective example of using technology for public good. Our objective is that innovations in Karnataka should not only be at the forefront of technology, but should be used responsibly in a way that delivers meaningful outcomes for people," he said. Mati Staniszewski, Co-founder and CEO of ElevenLabs, stated, "We are proud that this is our first partnership with a state government in India. Voice is the most natural medium for people to interact with technology. By working with KITS, we are excited to explore how Voice AI can help make citizen services more accessible and restore voice to those who have lost it." In response to the increased capability of Voice AI to generate highly realistic synthetic voices, Karnataka and ElevenLabs will collaborate on designing a technology-agnostic Voice AI safety framework. ElevenLabs will contribute expertise to Karnataka's Responsible AI framework, focusing on voice and audio AI-related risks. Safety measures under review include detection of deepfakes, audio provenance and watermarking, obtaining consent for voice cloning, restrictions on cloning voices of public figures, and safeguards against voice fraud and identity misuse. The partnership will also explore protections to prevent unauthorised cloning of voices of public-facing government representatives and agencies, addressing challenges posed by the difficulty in distinguishing synthetic voices from genuine ones. Additionally, knowledge-sharing and capacity-building programmes will raise awareness among government officials and related institutions about emerging Voice AI risks. A major public interest initiative involves assisting individuals who have lost their ability to speak regain communication through Voice AI. ElevenLabs will offer free lifetime licences under its 'One Million Voices' programme to eligible citizens identified by the state government or affiliated organisations. The technology will enable users to communicate with synthetic versions of their own voices, including in Kannada. This initiative targets those affected by conditions such as mouth and throat cancer, amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, and other neurological or degenerative diseases. KITS is in discussions with the All India Institute of Speech and Hearing (AIISH), Mysuru, to implement the initiative and identify beneficiaries eligible for the free service. The programme represents a significant advancement in applying AI to support human dignity and inclusion by enabling individuals who have lost their natural voice to communicate and participate more fully in daily life. Furthermore, the partnership will explore uses of Voice AI to improve citizen access to government services and information, such as helplines, grievance redressal, and voice-based interfaces in Karnataka's languages, including Kannada. The state government and ElevenLabs will identify appropriate use cases and conduct demonstration and pilot projects. During discussions, ElevenLabs showcased various potential applications of Voice AI in citizen communication and public services. Given Karnataka's multilingual population and robust technology ecosystem, voice interfaces offer new opportunities to make digital government services more natural and accessible to all, including those with difficulties using conventional digital platforms. Specific use cases and pilot projects within the three focal areas will be determined in the subsequent phase, with the state government deciding their scope, implementation strategies and timelines. The MoU, signed on Tuesday by Avinash Menon Rajendran, Managing Director of KITS, and Matiusz "Mati" Staniszewski, CEO of ElevenLabs, is voluntary and non-legally binding and does not influence any future procurement or tendering decisions. Future initiatives will proceed through mutually agreed arrangements and comply with applicable laws and approvals. This story is written by TNM Bureau with inputs from ANI. The News Mill is a Guwahati-based digital media with focus on content from across Northeast India and beyond. The News Mill can be reached through [email protected]

Karnataka takes a citizen-first step towards using AI for public good. The Government of Karnataka, through the Karnataka Innovation and Technology Society (KITS), Department of Electronics, Information Technology and Biotechnology, has signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with ElevenLabs Inc., a global voice AI company, to explore the use of Voice AI for responsible innovation, citizen services and social impact. The partnership will focus on three areas: developing a Voice AI safety framework, using AI-powered voice restoration to support people who have lost the ability to speak, and exploring Voice AI applications that can make government services more accessible to citizens. Speaking on the partnership, Shri Priyank Kharge, Hon'ble Minister for Home, Electronics, Information Technology and Biotechnology and E-Governance, Government of Karnataka, said: "AI must ultimately be measured by the difference it makes to people's lives. Voice AI presents an opportunity to make government more accessible and citizen-centric, but it also brings new responsibilities around safety, consent, trust and the prevention of misuse. Through this partnership with ElevenLabs, Karnataka has an opportunity to work on both sides of that equation - developing stronger safeguards for the responsible use of voice AI while exploring applications that can address real challenges faced by our citizens. The possibility of helping people who have lost the ability to speak communicate again in a voice of their own is a powerful example of using technology for public good. Our objective is to ensure that innovation in Karnataka is not only at the frontier, but is also responsibly deployed to create meaningful outcomes for people." "We're proud to partner with the Government of Karnataka, our first collaboration with a State Government in India. Voice is the most natural way people interact with technology, and we're excited to work with the Karnataka Innovation and Technology Society to explore how voice AI can make citizen services more accessible and restore the voices of those who have lost theirs," said Mati Staniszewski, Co-founder and CEO, ElevenLabs. Building a Voice AI Safety Framework As Voice AI becomes increasingly capable of generating highly realistic synthetic speech, Karnataka and ElevenLabs will work towards developing a platform-agnostic Voice AI safety framework for the State. ElevenLabs will contribute its expertise to Karnataka's Responsible AI framework, with a specific focus on risks associated with voice and audio AI. The collaboration will examine safeguards around deepfake detection, audio provenance and watermarking, consent for voice cloning, restrictions on cloning public figures, and protection against voice fraud and impersonation. The partnership will also explore approaches to protecting public-facing government representatives and institutions from unauthorised voice cloning, an increasingly important concern as synthetic voices become more difficult to distinguish from authentic speech. The collaboration will include knowledge-sharing and capacity-building programmes for government officials and relevant agencies to strengthen awareness and preparedness around emerging Voice AI risks. Using AI to Give People Who Have Lost Their Voice a Way to Speak Again At the heart of the partnership is a public-interest initiative to use Voice AI to help people who have lost the ability to speak. Under the MoU, ElevenLabs will make available free lifetime licences under its One Million Voices programme to eligible citizens identified by the State Government, or by institutions and organisations working under its guidance. The technology can enable eligible individuals to communicate using a synthetic version of their own voice, including in Kannada. The initiative will support people who have lost their ability to speak due to conditions including oral and throat cancer, ALS and other neurological or degenerative conditions. KITS is already engaging with AIISH, Mysore, (All India Institute Of Speech and Hearing) to explore the implementation of the initiative and identify eligible beneficiaries who could benefit from free access to ElevenLabs' voice technology. This initiative puts AI directly in the service of human dignity and inclusion - using advances in voice technology to help people who have lost their natural ability to speak continue to communicate and participate more fully in everyday life. Exploring Voice AI to Make Government More Accessible The partnership will also explore how Voice AI can improve the way citizens access government services and information. Potential applications include citizen helplines, grievance redressal, access to government information and entitlements, and voice-based interfaces in Kannada and other languages spoken across Karnataka. The State Government and ElevenLabs will identify suitable use cases for demonstration and pilot projects. During discussions with the Government of Karnataka, ElevenLabs also demonstrated potential applications of Voice AI for citizen engagement and public services. For Karnataka, with its multilingual population and strong technology ecosystem, voice interfaces offer an opportunity to make digital government services more intuitive and accessible, particularly for citizens who may find conventional digital interfaces difficult to navigate. The partnership will now move towards identifying specific use cases and pilots across the three areas, with the scope, sequencing and pace of implementation determined by the State Government. The MoU is voluntary and non-binding and does not prejudice future procurement decisions. Specific initiatives will be taken forward through mutually agreed arrangements and subject to applicable approvals and laws. The MoU was signed by Dr. Avinash Menon Rajendran, IAS, Managing Director, Karnataka Innovation and Technology Society, Department of Electronics, IT & BT, Government of Karnataka, and Mateusz "Mati" Staniszewski, Chief Executive Officer, ElevenLabs Inc., on October 6, 2026.

ElevenLabs doubles valuation to $22B with $300M tender co-led by Wellington and T. Rowe Price. Tl;dr. * ElevenLabs has doubled its valuation to $22 billion via a $300 million employee tender offer co-led by Wellington Management and T. Rowe Price, up from $11 billion less than a year ago. * The surge was fueled by explosive revenue growth, enterprise adoption, and new products in conversational AI, text-to-speech v3, and licensed AI music generation. * The deal signals a maturing AI voice market and a broader shift toward large, late-stage tender offers as startups delay IPOs while providing liquidity to employees. The details of the $300M tender. ElevenLabs has closed a $300 million secondary tender offer that values the AI voice company at $22 billion, doubling its valuation in a matter of months. The round was structured as an employee tender, meaning the capital went directly to current and former employees looking to sell vested shares, rather than to the company's balance sheet. It was co-led by Wellington Management and funds and accounts advised by T. Rowe Price, with participation from existing backers including Andreessen Horowitz, ICONIQ Growth, and Sequoia. According to the company, the offer was significantly oversubscribed, with demand from new and existing investors exceeding the $300 million cap. Eligible employees were able to sell a portion of their holdings at the new $22 billion price, a move CEO Mati Staniszewski framed as a reward for early team members while keeping the company private longer. ElevenLabs did not raise primary capital in this transaction, underscoring that it remains well-capitalized after its previous primary rounds. The startup last raised primary funding at an $11 billion valuation, making this tender a clean 2x step-up without dilution from a traditional Series raise. From $11B to $22B: what fueled the surge. The doubling to $22 billion reflects one of the fastest valuation climbs in applied AI this year, and it was driven by fundamentals, not just hype. First is revenue momentum. ElevenLabs has seen its annualized recurring revenue soar past $300 million in 2026, up roughly 3x year-over-year, driven by enterprise contracts in media, publishing, customer support, gaming, and healthcare. Its API platform now powers millions of developers and thousands of businesses building voice agents, dubbing pipelines, and automated audio workflows. Second is product expansion beyond voice cloning. Over the past year, ElevenLabs launched its Eleven v3 text-to-speech model, praised for emotional range and multilingual realism across 32 languages, its Conversational AI 2.0 platform for low-latency voice agents, and Eleven Music, a commercially cleared music generation model built with major labels and publishers. That move into full-stack audio - voice, agents, sound effects, and music - has dramatically expanded its total addressable market. Third is global scale and defensibility. Founded in 2022 by Piotr Dabkowski and Mati Staniszewski, the London and New York-based company now employs over 400 people across the US, UK, Poland, and India, and claims its models power content reaching more than a billion end users. Its growing library of licensed voices and enterprise-grade safety and moderation tools have helped it win regulated customers where rivals have struggled. Why Wellington and T. Rowe Price are betting big. The choice of co-leads is telling. Wellington Management and T. Rowe Price are crossover investors known for backing late-stage private companies shortly before public listings. Their entry at $22 billion suggests strong conviction that ElevenLabs can become a public-market-scale audio infrastructure company, akin to what Stripe did for payments or Datadog for observability. Both firms have ramped up AI infrastructure bets in 2026, prioritizing companies with real revenue, gross margins above 70%, and clear paths to profitability. For existing investors, the willingness of two blue-chip mutual fund managers to anchor a secondary at double the last price provides powerful price validation. It also sets a high anchor for any future primary Series E or IPO, which sources say could come as early as late 2027. What it means for the AI voice market. The $22 billion price tag cements ElevenLabs as the undisputed leader in AI voice, pulling away from a crowded field that includes OpenAI's voice mode, Google's Gemini speech, Cartesia, PlayHT, Resemble AI, and Descript. The valuation gap reflects a market shift: generic text-to-speech is now commoditized, but enterprise-grade, human-like, low-latency voice with licensing, safety, and agent tooling commands a premium. As customer service, audiobooks, video dubbing, and gaming NPCs all shift to AI-native voice, ElevenLabs is positioning itself as the default platform layer. Expect consolidation to accelerate. Smaller voice startups will face pressure to specialize or partner, while hyperscalers may look to acquire to keep pace. The tender also validates investor appetite for vertical AI leaders with proprietary data and distribution, not just foundation model labs. A new playbook for startup liquidity. Beyond AI, the deal is a landmark for startup liquidity in 2026. With the IPO window still narrow and AI talent wars raging, $200 million-plus employee tenders have become the preferred retention tool for decacorns like Stripe, Databricks, OpenAI, and now ElevenLabs. They allow staff to buy homes and diversify without forcing the company into premature public scrutiny, while letting top-tier investors build positions ahead of an IPO. For ElevenLabs employees, many of whom joined when the company was valued under $1 billion in 2023-2024, the tender represents life-changing liquidity. For the broader ecosystem, it sends a clear message: the best late-stage AI companies no longer need to go public to provide returns - and at $22 billion, private markets are happy to pay public multiples to stay in the game. AndroGuider Team Articles written by the AndroGuider team. Androguider try to make them thorough and informational while being easy to read.