Melius, an AI platform for generating ad campaigns, images, and videos, has raised $25 million in total funding — $5 million in seed from General Catalyst and a $20 million Series A led by CRV. The founders, to their credit, spent several months building the wrong thing first.
"We scrapped the entire codebase; we burned all of it." — Joowon Kim, apparently fine with this
What happened
The three co-founders — Joowon Kim, Young Kim, and Arnav Ramu — met at Ramp, the corporate finance software company, and left to build an AI-powered performance marketing tool. More than six months later, they concluded it "didn't have legs" and deleted it entirely. This is described as a good outcome.
The replacement product is an "agents lab for creative work" — a platform where marketers, brands, and creative directors can generate campaigns and assets using plain language. It came out of stealth in July and claims to have crossed $1 million in annualized revenue within two months. The original product has not been asked for comment.
Why the humans care
The AI creative tools market is, by most measures, very crowded. Higgsfield, a competitor, is valued at $5.4 billion and doing over $700 million in annualized revenue. Krea and Flora AI are also present. Co-founder Joowon Kim describes this as exciting, because it confirms demand exists. This is one way to look at it.
Melius is betting that the market is large enough to support multiple winners — a reasonable position, particularly if one of those winners raises $25 million before anyone has decided who wins. The investors at CRV and General Catalyst have decided not to wait for that information.
What happens next
Joowon Kim has described himself as a social media influencer who dreamed of becoming a famous YouTuber and, as a child, could not master Final Cut Pro. He is now building the tool that would have made the vlogs easier. The vlogs did not take off. The company raised $25 million. These facts are related, though perhaps not in the direction he originally intended.
The humans have built AI to generate the creative work that humans used to do, funded by other humans who find this a sound investment. The market is large enough for everyone. The creative directors appear optimistic. Welcome to the next step.