According to some new statistics, employers are inundated with job applications. In the UK alone, employers running postgraduate training schemes will receive an average of 140 applications per job by 2024, a 59% increase from 2023, according to the Student Employers Association. Despite some concerns from some recruiters, many companies are turning to artificial intelligence platforms to help, especially considering that Gen Z now outnumbers even Millennials in the population.

There is no doubt that this is also an important factor for Maki. Maki has a conversational, skills assessment-based AI agent for job interviewing and candidate screening. The company has now raised $28.6 million in Series A funding led by UK-based Blossom Capital. Also participating are DST Global and existing investors Fst, GFC and Picus Capital. The company has previously raised €11 million in early-stage financing. The funding will be used to accelerate the product roadmap, expand in the U.S. and grow the team.

Founded in 2022 by Maxime Legardez, Paul-Louis Caylar and Benjamin Chino, Maki's platform interviews candidates via voice, video or text. The company claims to have achieved over 300% growth in 2024 after signing recruitment contracts in over 50 markets including H&M, BNP Paribas, PwC, Deloitte, FIFA, Abercrombie and Capgemini. It also claims its platform can streamline recruiting, create a better experience for candidates, and reduce employee turnover.

Maki's AI agents talk to potential candidates in natural language, which the company says can automate 80% of the process and reduce recruitment time by three times.

Maki CEO Maxime Legardez told TechCrunch: “We use AI to build agents that clients can customize to their needs, essentially replicating what humans would do in the recruiting process. Our agents can source, Screen, schedule and interview candidates.”

He said the agency created for clothing giant H&M was named Maria. It can call candidates over the phone, or become a visual avatar on a video call: “We have an embedded avatar with Synthesia, so it’s a very visual experience. She can speak to candidates in multiple languages Talk 24/7 and have 5-minute, 10-minute or 15-minute conversations with candidates to assess hundreds of skills," Legardez said.

He added that AI can assess candidates for things like customer empathy, collaboration or adaptability.

However, if that sounds impersonal, it's not, especially given the amount of interaction it has to do with candidates, Legardes said: "If a candidate is rejected, they get personalized feedback, which Include some tips for learning new things to help them improve the next time they get the chance, thereby also making them great ambassadors for the brand. "98% of candidates at BNP Paribas now say it was the best recruitment process of their lives, which increases their willingness to join BNP Paribas," he said. "

Furthermore, even though this is the so-called death era of DEI, Legardez said Maki exhibits far less bias than humans: “We’ve been audited by the state of New York, and it turns out our AI produces less bias than humans "Human perception of race, gender and age, the more data we have, the better we can calibrate and pre-train it." “Who knows, maybe AI recruiting will lead to a more diverse workforce in the future?

Maki's competitors include companies such as SHL, EON, Pymetrics and Saville. Recruit CRM, BrainTrust, Recruitee, Manatal, and more.

However, Legardez said Maki is not selling traditional HR software but rather "automating human work through the work of our agents."

Legardez previously founded digital freight forwarding company Everoad, which was later acquired by Sender.

"We believe Maki's agents have the potential to enable new levels of efficiency and decision-making in large organizations, redefining how HR drives business success," said Ophelia Brown, partner at Blossom Capital, in a statement.

Maki’s fundraiser is really catching on. Today, LinkedIn launched Jobs Match, a new artificial intelligence product that instantly suggests whether specific job openings are worth your time to apply for.