Most AI still shows up as text in a box. Tavus builds AI you talk to on video instead. It’s a face on the screen that looks at you through your camera, listens, and answers in about a second (that’s their claim, anyway).
You’ve probably seen AI avatars before. Stiff talking heads that read a script and blink on a timer, usually sitting right in the uncanny valley. Tavus is trying to build the version that reacts to you live, which is a much harder problem.
What it means
Tavus is a San Francisco company that sells real-time AI video to other businesses. Developers plug it into their own apps and websites, so the face you end up talking to might carry a bank’s name or a tutoring company’s name, not Tavus’s. Hassaan Raza and Quinn Favret started it around 2020, and the first product was personalized sales video: record one clip, and it remade itself with every prospect’s name.
It runs on three of its own models. One draws the face (Phoenix), one reads your expressions and what’s around you (Raven), and one handles timing (Sparrow), meaning when to talk and when to stay quiet.
Why it matters
The money is modest by AI standards. Tavus raised a $40 million Series B in November 2025, led by CRV, which brought it to about $64 million total. That’s small next to the big labs, and it tells you Tavus isn’t trying to build the smartest brain. It’s building the face and ears that sit on top of one.
Timing is harder than it looks. Telling the difference between someone who finished a thought and someone who’s just pausing is what keeps a conversation from turning into two people talking over each other. Tavus built a whole model for that one job, and it’s the part a lot of voice assistants still kinda fumble.
It’s cheap to try, and the jobs are familiar ones: sales calls, coaching, intake interviews, customer support. The free tier gives developers 20 minutes of video a month, capped at five minutes per conversation. That’s enough to find out whether your customers like talking to it or find it a little creepy, which is honestly the real question.
Simple example
A driving instructor sits in the passenger seat and watches your hands on the wheel. You drift toward the curb and she says “ease left” before you notice. Your knuckles go white at the on-ramp, and she talks you through the merge without you asking.
The driver’s manual has the same rules in it, every one, for free. But the manual can’t see you drifting. Tavus wants to sell companies the instructor.