Tallinn-based startup Pickmybrain has successfully closed a $2.1 million pre-seed funding round to advance its innovative AI platform. The company, formerly known as WOIS.io, enables experts and public figures to create AI-powered "Digital Brains" that scale their knowledge and insights. This new capital will be used to expand the team, enhance product features, and accelerate the company's international growth strategy.
A New Paradigm for Expertise Sharing
Many professionals and public figures face the challenge of sharing their expertise at scale without being consumed by repetitive inquiries or constant content creation. Pickmybrain addresses this issue by providing a platform where specialized knowledge can be accessed on demand. The company's solution arrives as AI personas are gaining mainstream traction, offering a practical application for digital likenesses in the expert economy.
How the Digital Brains Work
The platform operates by training AI models on an expert’s curated and structured knowledge, including interviews, articles, books, and recorded responses. Experts retain complete control over the content used for training, ensuring each Digital Brain reflects their unique perspective rather than generic internet data. For individuals without an extensive digital footprint, the platform provides tools to generate new content inputs for the AI to learn from.
Pickmybrain employs a hybrid model that combines automated responses with direct human interaction for a comprehensive user experience. The AI efficiently handles routine questions, providing instant answers, while more complex or high-value queries are routed directly to the expert. This interaction occurs through one-to-one asynchronous video, allowing personal engagement to be maintained while scaling knowledge access effectively.
High-Profile Adoption and Market Vision
The platform has already attracted over 1,000 professionals from diverse fields such as business, sports, and entertainment. Notable users include Peter Vesterbacka, the co-founder of Rovio and Slush, former Netflix CMO Bozoma Saint John, and World Cup-winning footballer Paul Pogba. This early adoption by high-profile figures underscores the platform's appeal and its potential to serve a wide range of experts.
Founder Sergei Verbitski views the technology as a new avenue for professionals to monetize their expertise without becoming full-time content producers. He positions the platform as a tool for personalization, creating AI models built around an individual's specific knowledge base. This approach aims to empower experts in a manner similar to how Patreon enabled creators to monetize their content directly from their audience.
Strategic Funding and Future Growth
The $2.1 million pre-seed investment was sourced from a group of business angels, including early Insilico Medicine investor Garri Zmudze and the investment platform Raison.app. This funding is strategically allocated to fuel team growth, support expansion into new international markets, and drive continuous product development. The investment signals strong market confidence in Pickmybrain's vision for the future of monetized expertise and knowledge sharing.
Pickmybrain is positioning itself as a shift away from the ad-driven creator economy toward a utility-first expert economy. The platform challenges attention-based business models by offering a direct, transactional alternative for monetizing knowledge without relying on advertising revenue. This allows professionals to scale their impact based on the value of their insights rather than their ability to generate viral content.
With its successful $2.1 million funding round, Pickmybrain is well-positioned to redefine how expert knowledge is shared and monetized. By transforming individual expertise into scalable AI-driven counterparts, the platform offers a practical solution for professionals and a valuable resource for users seeking specialized insights. The company's innovative hybrid model and strategic vision signal a significant step forward in the evolution of the global expert economy.