India-based audio platform Pocket FM has over 200,000 hours of content on its service. However, CEO Rohan Nayak believes the platform still has room to grow in terms of creating original content and expanding its library into multiple genres and subgenres. The quickest way to do that is by leveraging AI tools that can help with audio production, writing strategies, and adapting stories for different regions.
“We feel that our content catalog is still not good enough for our users. There are many genres and subgenres that are not in our library. I don’t think there’s any content,” Nayak told TechCrunch over the phone.
The company already has a great partnership with Eleven Labs to convert writing into audio series. This makes production 5x faster and 30x cheaper than professionally produced audio series.
“We have already tested how these AI adaptations work in different markets and have seen encouraging results. We are still refining our models for errors, but We feel that this technology is good enough to be used in the production of shows,” Nayak said.
One of the AI tools that Pocket FM is experimenting with supports the adoption of stories in different regions. The company said it has trained an in-house model to handle cultural nuances when translating stories from one region to another, rather than just translation.
He added that resolving the model's hallucinations in a story that spans hundreds of episodes is difficult. Pocket FM said it needed to address the limitations of the open source model's context window and build a map of relationships between different entities in the story to maintain character consistency.
Another tool the company offers writers is to serve as their creative assistant, testing their work and helping them with alternative storylines or giving them ideas for plots. The company also plans to infuse the tool with insights from historical data to show writers what works on the platform.
Nayak said the tool is still in its early stages, but the company wants to empower the writers' room to solo writers who may publish episodes a day. He said Writer's Room allows you to brainstorm without taking away creative control, which is the core idea behind this writing assistant.
The company is also investing in creating a Blockbuster Engine that leverages insights from the platform about what shows are hits.
Given that Pocket FM produces its own content and produces programming through a network of writers, Pocket FM's ultimate goal is to expand its catalogue. But to scale up and become more popular, you need to create hit shows.
“Blockbusters drive every content platform. While the top of the funnel is well-prepared with user-generated content, finding blockbusters remains a challenge.”
Pocket FM has shown promising results with the introduction of AI. There are over 40,000 series of AI-powered platforms for voice creation. Additionally, the company generates $3 million in revenue from them. Overall, the platform posted $127 million in fiscal year 2024.
The company's biggest challenge is striking the right balance between AI-powered creative support and rapid mass production of content. When using AI to speed up content production, there is always a risk of compromising quality. As a result, the platform is filled with mediocre content, making it difficult for algorithms to highlight good shows.
India-based author and lyricist Puneet Sharma points out that in a world where so much work is formulaic, artists have a responsibility to prove their work is authentic. did.
Sharma added that AI tools can help writers generate ideas and learn different styles. However, this means that the process of learning through failure can be lost in the process of using these tools.
Nayak said some writers and creators are already using AI tools. The company's idea is to provide tools with story and platform context.
Pocket FM has raised $197 million in funding across multiple rounds with backers including Lightspeed Ventures, Tencent, and Times Internet. The company competes on multiple fronts with other content players such as Audible, Omidyar Network-backed Pratilipi, and Google-backed Kuku FM.