Micro1, a Scale AI competitor, touts crossing $100M ARR | TechCrunch

"Micro1's rapid climb over the past two years has pushed it into a cohort of AI companies scaling at breakneck speed. The three-year-old startup, which helps AI labs recruit and manage human experts for training data, started the year with roughly $7 million in annual recurring revenue (ARR). Today, it claims to have surpassed $100 million in ARR, founder and CEO Ali Ansari told TechCrunch. That figure is also more than double the revenue Micro1 reported in September when it announced its $35 million Series A at a $500 million valuation."

"Ansari, 24, said then that Micro1 works with leading AI labs, including Microsoft, as well as Fortune 100 companies racing to improve large language models through post-training and reinforcement learning. Their demand for top-tier human data has fueled a fast-expanding market that Ansari believes will grow from $10-15 billion today to nearly $100 billion within two years. Micro1's rise, and that of larger competitors such as Mercor and Surge, accelerated after OpenAI and Google DeepMind reportedly cut ties with Scale AI following Meta's $14 billion investment in the vendor and its decision to hire Scale's CEO."

"Ansari attributes Micro1's growth to its ability to recruit and evaluate domain experts quickly. Like Mercor, Micro1 began as an AI recruiter called Zara, matching engineering talent with software roles before pivoting into the data-training market. That tool now interviews and vets applicants seeking expert roles on the platform."

Micro1 scaled from roughly $7 million in ARR at the start of the year to a claimed more than $100 million in ARR by focusing on recruiting and managing human experts for AI training data. The company serves leading AI labs, including Microsoft, and Fortune 100 clients working on post-training and reinforcement learning. Strong demand for high-quality human data is driving a market that the founder estimates could expand from $10–15 billion today to nearly $100 billion within two years. Competitors such as Mercor and Surge report higher ARR, while Micro1 leverages rapid expert evaluation and a prior recruiting product, Zara, to accelerate growth. Two emerging segments, including non-AI-native Fortune 1000 enterprises building internal AI agents and support operations, are expected to reshape human-data economics.

Read at TechCrunch