AppDirect is acquiring AI avatar technology provider Soul Machines, a deal that will bring interactive avatars into its Devs.ai platform and expand the AI tools available to its advisors, partners, and customers.
The acquisition is aimed at helping businesses move beyond text-based AI and deploy more interactive experiences across sales, service, support, commerce, and employee workflows.
Soul Machines brings interactive AI avatars to AppDirect
The move enhances AppDirect’s AI capabilities and expands its ability to help advisors, partners, and businesses deploy an interactive AI experience across sales, service, support, and commerce.
Soul Machines’ technology will enable AppDirect to deliver more engaging interfaces for AI-powered interactions, helping businesses create digital experiences that are simpler for customers and employees to use.
“Soul Machines helps us take the next step in making AI more useful and more accessible for businesses,” said Nicolas Desmarais, Chairman and CEO of AppDirect. “Companies are no longer asking whether they should adopt AI; they’re asking how to put it to work in ways that improve customer engagement, support employees, and drive real business outcomes.”
Potential Soul Machines applications include:
- Customer support and self-service
- Learning and development
- Onboarding and training
- Employee help desks
- Digital commerce assistance
“By bringing Soul Machines’ avatar technology into the AppDirect platform, we can help our advisors and their customers move faster from experimentation to real-world deployment,” said Desmarais.
AppDirect plans to embed avatar technology in Devs.ai
Soul Machines’ avatar technology will soon be embedded in Devs.ai – AppDirect’s AI platform for building and managing business AI tools that helps the company create new ways for advisors and customers to launch branded AI applications without the complexity of building core infrastructure from scratch.
Any user will then be able to deploy a fully functioning interactive avatar to any project they use internally or launch externally.
“The next wave of enterprise AI will be defined not only by what the technology can do, but by how people experience it,” said Chris Herd, General Manager, Soul Machines. “Adding Soul Machines to Devs.ai helps us give customers a more interactive way to deploy AI across customer and employee journeys.”
Partners gain another path from AI pilots to deployment
Soul Machines’ customers will gain access to AppDirect’s broader platform, including new integrations, go-to-market opportunities, and enterprise AI capabilities through Devs.ai.
For AppDirect’s advisor ecosystem, the acquisition broadens the types of AI solutions partners can bring to customers without requiring them to build the underlying technology themselves.
By embedding Soul Machines into Devs.ai, AppDirect is positioning interactive AI avatars as another deployable capability partners can incorporate into customer and employee workflows.