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Character.ai Appoints Former Meta Executive Karandeep Anand as Chief Executive Officer

Character.AI, the Google-backed generative-chatbot platform serving tens of millions of monthly users, today named Karandeep Anand chief executive. Anand, previously VP of Business Products at Meta, president at Brex and a board adviser to Character.AI, succeeds co-founder Noam Shazeer, who joined Google last year under a technology-sharing pact now under antitrust review. 

Co-founder Daniel De Freitas becomes chief technology officer. Anand said his first 60-day goals include “smarter, lighter safety filters,” upgraded memory and transparency features, and model-quality gains as the company addresses child-protection litigation. 

Character.AI has raised over $150 million, predominantly from Andreessen Horowitz, and reports that 66 percent of its audience is aged 18–24, with 72 percent female worldwide today.

Featured image: Credit: Character.AI

James Dargan
About the author
James Dargan

James Dargan is a writer and researcher at The AI Insider. His focus is on the AI startup ecosystem and he writes articles on the space that have a tone accessible to the average reader.

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