AI voice tech firm ElevenLabs to launch new funding round, valuation may climb to $11 billion

According to a Jan. 17 report in the Financial Times, AI voice startupsElevenLabsNegotiations are underway for a new round offinancingThe latest valuation is expected to beUS$11 billion (about RMB 76.6 billion)The last valuation was nearlytwice as much.

If the deal is finalized, ElevenLabs will become theOne of the highest valued AI startups in the UK.

The financing talks come just four months after the company completed a secondary stock sale, which at the time was valued atUS$6.6 billion (about RMB 46 billion).

ElevenLabs' core products areCreative PlatformPlatform with embedded audio/video production hubStudio,AI music compositionIIMusicDubbingDubbingVoice transcriptionSpeech to text,text-to-speechAudio Nativeand other tools.

AI text-to-speech modelingEleven v3（Alpha)The underlying technology that underpins the platform and each embedded tool.

Foreign media outlet Smart Picko commented that ElevenLabs“ core strength is its "Almost indistinguishable from the real thing.”AIspeech productionThe ability to accurately restore intonation, emotion and nuance of expression makes synthesized speech more realistic and infectious.

In addition, ElevenLabs utilizestiered subscriptionmodel, covering free trials, professional editions, and enterprise-level solutions, making its products suitable for both individual creators and larger-scale commercial and enterprise-level application scenarios.

One, with a new round of funding on the horizon, ElevenLabs has nearly doubled its valuation in a few months to become one of Europe's most valuable AI startups

ElevenLabs is in preliminary contact with investors about a new round of financing, according to people familiar with the matter, with talks still in the early stages and final terms yet to be determined.

ElevenLabs completed a secondary stock offering just four months ago, which was valued at $6.6 billion at the time.

If this financing is successfully completed, the company's valuation will increase in just a few months from$6.6 billionraise to$11 billion, the valuation almost doubled.

In terms of regional competition, ElevenLabs has become one of the most highly valued AI startups in Europe, with a valuation level close to that of the French big model companiesMistral-- the latter was valued last September at nearly12 billion dollars (about 83.6 billion yuan).

By contrast, London self-driving companyWayvewas valued at about $8 billion when it raised money last October, and cloud computing startupsNscaleValued in September at approximatelyUS$3 billion (about RMB 20.9 billion).

As of press time, ElevenLabs has not commented on the Financial Times' request for comment on the funding round.

Second, focusing on AI to generate natural speech, ElevenLabs has been invested by Sequoia Capital, a16z and other organizations

ElevenLabs was founded in 2022 by Polish entrepreneurMati Staniszewskicap (a poem)Piotr DabkowskiCo-founded in London.

Mati Staniszewski, co-founder and CEO of ElevenLabs (Source: Financial Times)

The company is headquartered in London and New York, with offices in Warsaw, Bangalore and Tokyo, and has also completed its registration in the United States to allow for smoother matchmaking with U.S. venture capital.

ElevenLabs' core products areCreative PlatformThe platform has a one-stop shop for voice and audio content production.

Around this platform, ElevenLabs has integrated several capabilities in the form of embedded tool modules.StudioIt is a video and audio content production hub;IIMusicIn turn, it offers AI music creation capabilities;DubbingSupports automatic translation and dubbing in up to 29 languages;Speech to textFor voice transcription;Audio NativeUsed for text-to-speech.

▲ElevenLabs' embedded tools (Source: ElevenLabs website)

(indicates contrast)ProductionsExists as a hosted service for enterprises and content agencies, offering high-quality voiceover, localization and audio content production combined with human involvement, with a bias towards commercial delivery.

ElevenLabs has continued to iterate on voice AI models since launching the platform in January 2023, and is gradually expanding into conversational AI intelligences.

In June 2025 the company released the next generationText-to-speech modelingEleven v3 (Alpha)The model is the underlying technology that supports the platform and each embedded tool.

▲ AI voice model Eleven v3 (Source: ElevenLabs official website)

In December 2025, ElevenLabs launched its official mobile app, which supports the calling of models, including Eleven v3, for scenarios such as social media voiceovers and video narration.

On January 6, 2026, for enterprise users, the company made ElevenLabs' AI platform available on the Google Cloud Marketplace, which users can access directly through their GCP accounts.

▲Page detailing ElevenLabs' AI platform on Google Cloud Marketplace (Source: Cloud with Google)

ElevenLabs'Speech-to-text model Scribe v2Officially released on January 9, 2026, this version is officially described as its most accurate transcription model to date, with support for more than 90 languages and integration into the Creative Platform and APIs for bulk transcription, subtitling, and large-scale audio processing.

In terms of funding, ElevenLabs previously financed on January 30, 2025US$180 million (about RMB 1.3 billion)The company is valued atUS$3.3 billion (approximately RMB 23 billion).

In September 2025, the company doubled its valuation in a deal that allowed employees to sell the value of theUS$100 million (about RMB 700 million)of stock, the company is valued atUS$6.6 billion (about RMB 46 billion). At that time, the company's annual recurring revenue (ARR) has been achievedUS$200 million (about RMB 1.4 billion).

“Voice technology is becoming an important part of how we interact with technology, and ElevenLabs is enabling voice technology at scale. We're excited to continue to support their work building the next generation of AI speech,”a16zGeneral Partner and Head of Growth FundDavid GeorgeSays.

Currently, ElevenLabs has been awarded theSequoia Capital (Sequoia),Andreessen Horowitz (a16z),Iconiq,NEA,Smash Capitaland the corporate venture capital arm of the Financial Times in the UKFT VenturesSupported by a number of renowned organizations such as

Third, the user's reputation is divided: voice fidelity is sought after, price and stability are still controversial

As the scale of users and application scenarios expand, real-life feedback on the use of ElevenLabs is gradually coming into focus.

1,Application evaluation platform: voice naturalness is recognized, fine control and other aspects still need to be improved

existCapterraOn the review platform, Nishant T., an analyst from the financial services industry, said ElevenLabs has a clear advantage in text-to-speech, speech generation, and voice style customization, but the speed, intonation, and pauses of theFine controlThere is still room for improvement.

Multilingual AI Calls, Inc.AnunziMatías, the founder of ElevenLabs, commented after using ElevenLabs for one to two years, “ElevenLabs generates high-quality audio by typing in a script, with little to no post-processing, and its speech generation is close to that of a real person. However, when it comes to features such as music generationMultilingual accent coverageThere are still deficiencies.”

Third-party review sitesAiholics's comprehensive evaluation showed that ElevenLabs excelled in emotional expression, contextual understanding, and multilingual support. However, itsPricing complexity, and Eleven v3 is still in the Alpha stage in thestabilitycap (a poem)Real-time application scenariosThere are some limitations.

▲Review of ElevenLabs app (Source: Capterra)

2,Social media user reviews: transcription, price & stability, and more spark tweets

On January 9th ElevenLabs released theScribe v2Under the post, the hot comment is the userRichard ReisSaid that the ElevenLabs platform's voice transcription contains a lot of verbiage, such as “uh” and “ah,” and asked that it be removed from the transcribed text.

In response, ElevenLabs Growth and Engineering team membersLuke HarriesReply “Good suggestion! Have taken a note in my little notebook”.

▲Hot review of ElevenLabs app on X (Source: X)

However, in the comments section, there are also a number of users who are interested in thepricesExpressing dissatisfaction, the company said that the product was “too expensive” and made exaggerated comments such as “I need a loan to use it”, and called for the introduction of lower-priced programs.

In addition, there are users who complain about individual modelsInconsistent quality of answersor suggest adding moreminor languagesupport, such as Swiss German, as well as coverage of a wider range of languages and accents in speech-to-write and text-to-speech.

▲ElevenLabs app reviews on X (Source: X)

Conclusion: Global Capital Chases AI, Europe Still Lags Behind U.S. Peers

While ElevenLabs' funding progress underscores the high level of global capital enthusiasm for AI startups, overall, European AI companies still lag significantly behind their U.S. counterparts in terms of funding scale and commercialization progress.

Take OpenAI for example, the US AI giant is now valued at a whoppingUS$500 billion (approx. Rs. 34823 billion). OpenAI is in talks for a new round of funding that could be as high asUS$80 billion (approx. RMB 557.2 billion), the overall valuation of the company may exceed800 billion dollars (about 557.16 billion yuan), which far exceeds the valuations of other AI companies.

In the future, the global AI competition pattern represented by OpenAI and other U.S. giants is becoming clearer and clearer, and we continue to look forward to whether ElevenLabs can further break through in the track surrounded by giants.

Sources: Financial Times, Smart Picko, Capterra, Aiholics, X