Context, a startup developing an AI-driven office productivity suite, announced on Wednesday it has raised $11 million in seed funding. Lux Capital led the round, with further participation from Qualcomm Ventures and General Catalyst. With this latest injection of capital, Context’s total funding now stands at approximately $15.75 million, and the company has reached a valuation of $70 million.
The venture was initiated by founder Joseph Semrai, a Thiel Fellow, who began working on Context in 2024. Semrai identified a critical gap in contemporary office applications: they were not specifically optimized to harness the full capabilities of advanced AI models. “Our existing software tools are scattered, designed individually without truly leveraging the strengths of today’s sophisticated AI,” Semrai explained. “At Context, our goal is to utilize these powerful models’ ability to process large amounts of context and smoothly integrate across multiple applications, driving better workplace productivity outcomes.”
Semrai envisions Context as a game-changing interface, using AI-driven interactions similar to chat applications commonly seen today. This vision stands on the shoulders of recent innovations in conversational AI, popularized by services like ChatGPT. Context aims to offer an intuitive, streamlined user experience for a variety of professional tasks, much like Cursor has provided a successful AI-driven workflow for software developers.
While tech giants like Google and Microsoft, as well as companies such as Canva and Notion, are intensely integrating AI capabilities into their productivity tools, Context still differentiates itself by focusing on deeper data analysis capabilities. According to Semrai, though many existing tools have evolved to pull data from third-party sources, they often fall short when users want sophisticated, integrated analytical insights. Context intends to bridge this gap by employing AI-driven reasoning that helps users draw more meaningful conclusions from the data they collect.
At the core of Context’s product is an accessible interface, centered around a conversational chat window. Through this interface, users can prompt the AI to carry out detailed searches, distill information from homegrown documents, external systems, and web content, and then seamlessly generate reports and presentations based on the gathered insights. Additionally, for users looking to integrate coding aspects into their workflow, Context includes a built-in Python interpreter capable of running scripts directly within the app.
The startup does not seek to immediately challenge dominant platforms such as Microsoft 365; rather, it is angled toward underserved segments of current productivity users. One significant advantage Context plans to introduce is offline functionality, allowing individuals to perform analysis tasks and draft documents drawn from locally stored data without needing internet access—a feature rarely offered by current generation AI-driven productivity solutions.
Context has established an accessible entry point with a free tier, offering users up to 50 usage credits, a single workspace, and support for teams of up to ten people. Those who need broader usage are offered a paid subscription at $20 per month, providing 2,000 credits with unlimited workspaces and team members.
