How do you pitch and market an innovation that sounds too good to be true?
The premise of Aphid, the new automation network, is that you can earn money while you sleep. Well, a digital version of yourself—your robot clone, so to say—can earn money for you while you sleep, run, or do whatever it is you’d rather be doing than an uninspired task at your job. Is the 40-hour workweek about to be rendered obsolete? Aphid’s visionary founder and CEO Brandon Cooper hopes so.
“Imagine waking up smiling because all you have to do is think about what you’d like to do next, not what you have to do next,” he says. “For many of us, this is a distant or unimaginable reality. Our goal at Aphid is to help people breathe freely again, to remind them that they don’t have to labor from one moment to the next.”
Cooper is a self-taught computer geek who moved to Los Angeles to start an artificial intelligence, machine learning, and blockchain technology company that aims to disrupt the 9 to 5. Before he took the leap into entrepreneurship, Cooper was a senior technology advisor with Apple for seven years.
Brandon Cooper, Aphid’s co-founder and Chief Executive Officer
When other advisors couldn’t figure out software and hardware issues, they brought them to Cooper for solutions. Often, there was such a nonstop queue of people and issues requiring his help that he wished he could clone himself and take off for the beach instead. Eventually, he realized this desire was actually the seed of an idea for a new product.
To help him realize his vision, Cooper reached out to former colleague Sean Ross and former Michigan State University classmate Shri Ramani to become Aphid’s co-founders. Today, the company’s Chief Technology Officer is none other than Chad Thomas, the self-described architect, designer, and coder of MySpace.
While there are many potential applications for Aphid’s technology, the company’s mission is to help people make a living wage while doing what they actually enjoy. Aphid’s digital bots—which the company calls ‘aClones’—work for you almost like an employee would, Cooper says.
“If your aClone is working for you 20, 40, or 60 hours a week online, you have more time and energy to dedicate to your craft and family,” he explains. “Time shouldn’t have to be a luxury. It’s something we’re all entitled to, something we all deserve to enjoy.”
To test his initial idea with users, Cooper and his team of about two dozen designed an AI data entry use case named Nucleus. Users earn money by generating text messages and tweets using AI to invite friends to the mobile app.
Each time your aClone completes a task, Cooper says, you will get paid for it. How much? The payout amount depends on the task at hand. Aphid’s automation network runs on its workforce leveraging system, which is patent pending. Crucially, you don’t need to know how to code to use Aphid—you can simply choose your favorite bots from its marketplace.
Aphid is a potential game-changer for small and medium sized businesses that can’t afford to hire full-time or even part-time help with ongoing tasks, like customer support. (Aphid has filed to trademark Bots-as-a-Service and AI-as-a-Service.)
Cooper believes AI will level the playing field for low-to-middle income people by making it possible to access information and tools that are usually inaccessible to them.
Aphid is currently raising for their seed round of $3 million and has received their first investment from new venture capital firm MOI, making Cooper one of the exceedingly few Black entrepreneurs to receive VC funding. According to Crunchbase, dollars invested in startups with Black founders have fluctuated between just 0.8% and 1.3% per year since 2017.
“We are giving people more time with their friends and family by having a robot work for them. Everyone on my team bought into that vision. So, they’re crazy, just like me!” he explains. “I’m grateful for them. It’s a project from outer space, and I love that aspect of what we’re doing, because it’s how we push humanity forward.”
Because the concept he’s selling is so new, Cooper has gotten used to hearing a lot of follow-up questions. As he puts it, “What’s an iPhone to a caveman?”
Here is his advice for other entrepreneurs who have unbelievable ideas.
1. Keep your initial message very simple. Everyone wants to hear the sixth-grade version of a pitch, he told me.
2. Connect on an emotional level first. This is key. When people understand the why, they’re motivated to inquire about the technicalities, like the company’s financial forecast. At that point, Cooper will send over a pitch deck.
3. Don’t assume deals are forged in boardrooms. In his experience, most deals actually happen in informal locations, like bars and lounges.
4. Ignore the noise. Cooper’s advice to young people with a big dream is to focus.
“Everything is an illusion. Any obstacles, any problems that come your way, you have to ignore and stay focused on the gift that God has given you, which is to work on that idea you have,” he explains. “Most people can’t fathom things that they can’t see.”
He’s right. The grander your vision, the more likely others are to dismiss you. Keep going.
