Video editing made easy with startup’s AI solution

Monal Palmer doesn’t know when or where she will have an anxiety attack.

“We run away and fight for no reason multiple times a day,” he said of his anxiety disorder.

Recently, that obstacle has created an opportunity for the company he founded and leads. That’s Educational Vision Technologies (EVT), his San Diego-based B2B SaaS company that uses AI to automate video editing and knowledge curation.

Parmar participated in the 2Gether-International (2GI) 2023 Spring Cohort for disabled founders of tech startups. A two-month accelerator program supported by the Small Business Association and the National Institute on Disability addresses the employment and entrepreneurship gap for people with disabilities, the most overlooked and underemployed people in the United States. Participants in the 2GI cohort participated in workshops and trainings that addressed topics such as product market fit, business model design, management, sales and marketing, financial forecasting, and negotiations to help drive business forward.

“2GI understands that people learn differently, have challenges, and adapt the program to the entrepreneur rather than forcing the program to fit the entrepreneur,” said 2GI’s pitch. Palmer, who won the top prize of $10,000 in the contest, said.

“Founders participating in the Spring 2023 cohort are not only advocates, they are also leveraging platforms, expertise and innovation to address overlooked and underserved populations, including those with disabilities. We are improving communities that don’t exist,” said 2GI’s Founder, CEO and Chief Disability Officer. Diego Mariscal.

instant video editing

EVT’s instant video editing origins came from Parmar’s need for a note-taking solution while he was a student at the University of California, San Diego. We have developed a program that uses AI to generate notes of what professors write on blackboards and whiteboards.

“That’s where it all started. As a student with disabilities, it’s very difficult for me to take notes, so I developed an automatic note-taking system,” he said.

With the rise of virtual classrooms, he saw an opportunity with his platform to reduce the cost of video editing online classes, which cost hundreds of dollars per hour of video.

Currently, the EVT platform uses artificial intelligence to automate video editing and content curation, transforming long video recordings into short video chapters by topic, as well as creating tables of contents and other course content such as whiteboards. It also generates PDFs of class notes from ). Online learning becomes more accessible and engaging.

“Watching lengthy webinars, talks and trainings is painful, and considering there are 45 billion minutes of Zoom sessions per year, the problem is huge,” Palmer said. “We make it easy to understand so that you can actually access the relevant information.”

EVT’s business model is a usage-based, tiered SaaS model. Their base rate is $1,500 per year, or $60 per hour, which equates to about 25 hours of content curation. According to Palmer, the highest-level breakdown with volume discounts will bring him to $30 an hour.

“If we had a human doing all the manual curation, an hour of video could easily cost upwards of $450,” he added. “And instead of spending days or even weeks picking it out, for $30 you do it almost instantly.”

The product is already gaining momentum among academic institutions, with four universities already signed up as customers. Pradeep Khosla, president of the University of California, San Diego, also endorses the company. “They have not only improved accessibility, but they have also helped improve student satisfaction with distance learning,” he was quoted as saying on the EVT website.

In addition to universities, EVT also contracts sales training groups and conducts pilot programs with two Fortune 150 companies.

fundraiser

In addition to the $10,000 2GI pitch contest prize, EVT recently won $1,750 in a pitch contest at Santa Clara University through the school’s CIOCCA Center for Innovation and Entrepreneurship. One of his EVT team members is a graduate student.

The prize money is in addition to $750,000 raised in a friends and family round that began four years ago, averaging about $20,000 from various investors in Palmer’s social circles. . EVT is currently raising a $1.5 million seed round to expand its business.

“We have proven technology that improves learning outcomes in higher education. We have a large number of higher education customers. ,” Palmer said.

educational vision technology

Established: 2018
CEO: Monal Palmar
Headquarters: University of California, San Diego, Design and Innovation Building
Business description: B2B SaaS company that automates video editing and knowledge curation using AI
Revenue: $100,000 or more in higher education sales
Employees: 5 and 3 full-time interns over the summer
Website: EVT.ai
Notable: EVT is endorsed by UC San Diego President Pradeep Khosla