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Business Insider
26-05-2025
- Business
- Business Insider
3 money questions experts say you should never ask AI — and 3 you should
AI struggles with certain math questions, so asking it to calculate your taxes might go poorly. AI can help you with budgeting and financial habits; for more complex questions, ask a human expert. Rather than asking AI how to invest for retirement, use it to assess how on track you are now. Haven't yet tapped into the power of artificial intelligence? Then it might be time to get on board. 71% of businesses regularly use AI for at least one function of their business, up from 65% just last year. With AI being used for everything from customer service to diagnosing medical issues, traffic management, self-driving cars, and even fraud detection, it makes sense that the financial industry is getting on board. But sometimes, it makes sense to consult a real, live person rather than AI when dealing with your finances. Here are three questions you should never ask AI, plus a few you should. Don't ask: What are my estimated tax payments this year? When working with AI, keeping it general is key, said LJ Suzuki, President of CFOshare, a company that uses Read AI to outsource finance departments for growing small businesses. "It's OK to ask AI, 'How do estimated income taxes work for S-corporations?' but you should not ask AI, 'Please calculate my estimated income tax payments for the next year,'" he explained. It's most useful for providing generalized feedback, he said. "AI is great for providing broad and general advice to someone who knows nothing about a topic. If you're unsure how to estimate your income tax payments, AI can give you a great overview of the concept." Where it falls short, ironically, are logical operations, such as math. "Lots of people are confused by this since traditional computers are excellent at logical operations (better than humans)," he explained. "AI is different — it thinks more intuitively, which means it makes logical errors." Don't ask: How should I invest my money? Focus on personal questions that delve into your habits. "'Where did all my money go this month?', 'How much am I actually spending on takeout?' These honest, habit-focused questions are where AI shines," said Sam Taylor, VP of technology at Cleo, an AI financial assistant. He noted that it's best to avoid personalized guidance on investments, loans, and other major financial decisions as of now. (For those questions, consider hiring a financial advisor.) "There will come a day when AI can give you personalized guidance in the way of investments, loans, and more," Taylor said. "But, for now, focus on principles like how to start saving, building a budget, and where you can better your financial habits." Don't ask: What can I do to reach my retirement goals? Instead ask: Am I on track for my target retirement date? Determining whether someone is on track for their target retirement date is one area in which AI shines. Joseph Patrick Roop, financial advisor and host of the 'Retire(meant) for Living' podcast, asked an AI assistant that question, telling it, "'I'm 52 years old, have $500,000 in my 401(k), $63,000 saved in a brokerage account.' "It really did a great job laying out my target retirement date, what I have saved, including any Social Security or pensions." But it was missing that human element. "As a financial advisor looking at this, there are some other ways we could help this client get to their desired income by utilizing some other tools that it didn't bring up," said Roop. "From a very novice standpoint, if you're not a financial advisor and want to know where you stand, I thought the answers were very good." Remember, AI is still evolving Regardless of how sophisticated AI may seem, it can't replace a human just yet, especially when it comes to finances. "AI is still not capable enough to replace a financial strategist," Suzuki explained. But if you're looking for general advice on financial best practices, AI can help. "AI is great at generating ideas and financial best practices," Suzuki said. "For example, if you are having trouble collecting payment from customers, you can ask, 'List the best practices in collecting payments in B2B sales.' I guarantee you'll find some useful ideas you'd never previously considered."
Yahoo
14-05-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
AI note-taking app Granola raises $43M at $250M valuation, launches collaborative features
AI-powered note-taking tool Granola has been on a roll. The startup's seen a steep uptick in usage since it launched a year ago, mostly thanks to word of mouth among VCs and founders, but a big driver seems to be the fact that people are using it for doing more than its core pitch — automated note-taking for meetings. Granola's co-founder, Chris Pedragel, told TechCrunch that the company's users are increasingly using Granola for taking personal notes, which helps them make all their information, both from work and otherwise, available to the app's AI to parse and surface insights from. "[People] have Granola open all day because they have a lot of meetings, so it's like [...] where they're starting to live," he said. Pedragel said Granola's organic popularity among the tech crowd and diversifying use-cases has helped its user base grow 10% every week since its launch, though he didn't specify how many users it currently has. Off the back of that rapid growth and popularity, Granola on Wednesday said it has raised $43 million in a Series B funding round led by Nat Friedman and Daniel Gross's venture firm, NFDG, at a valuation of $250 million. The round also saw participation from existing investors Lightspeed and Spark, as well as angel investors including Vercel's Guillermo Rauch, Replit's Amjad Masad, Shopify's Tobi Lutke, and Linear's Karri Saarinen. The round brings the company's total funding raised to $67 million. Alongside this funding, Granola is also extending its remit beyond its current single-user focus to make itself more useful for businesses: It's launching a new collaboration feature that lets users share transcripts and notes with teammates, and enable the app's AI take to advantage of a broader pool of notes and details to surface insights. Users in an organization can create custom folders for various collaborative use cases like sales calls, customer feedback and hiring. The app will also let users share meeting notes with people who don't use Granola to let them chat with its AI and ask it questions. Other meeting transcription and note-taking apps, such as Read AI, Fireflies and Otter, already offer similar shared space features. Pedregal, though, says Granola is for more than note-taking. "I think how Granola differs from other notetakers is that it is very personal and you are in control all the time. You can edit notes at any point. It is not about just capturing a meeting, but it is a space where you can work, even post meetings," he said. Earlier this month, Granola updated its app to enable users to ask the AI bot questions about all meetings it had recorded. Building on that, the company will now allow users to ask questions about specific folders as well. Granola's new collaborative focus is part of a broader trend — many AI-powered meeting transcription and note-taking tools are expanding their focus and building integrations with other tools as they try to become a hub that stores and lets users search through knowledge from various sources. Meanwhile, productivity suites are introducing transcription tools to keep customers from having to use other apps for that purpose. For instance, Notion just yesterday launched an AI meeting note-taking tool. Lightspeed's Mike Mignano believes that Granola has an edge in this space because of its interface and user experience. "Since the start, the company has had the right mix of AI transcript and human control of taking notes. Now that they are building context across the meetings and making the notes shareable, the product has become stronger. With these features, Granola will have long-term context for users and teams, kicking off network effects for the startup," he said. This article originally appeared on TechCrunch at Error in retrieving data Sign in to access your portfolio Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data
TechCrunch
14-05-2025
- Business
- TechCrunch
AI note-taking app Granola raises $43M at $250M valuation, launches collaborative features
AI-powered note-taking tool Granola has been on a roll. The startup's seen a steep uptick in usage since it launched a year ago, mostly thanks to word of mouth among VCs and founders, but a big driver seems to be the fact that people are using it for doing more than its core pitch — automated note-taking for meetings. Granola's co-founder, Chris Pedragel, told TechCrunch that the company's users are increasingly using Granola for taking personal notes, which helps them make all their information, both from work and otherwise, available to the app's AI to parse and surface insights from. '[People] have Granola open all day because they have a lot of meetings, so it's like […] where they're starting to live,' he said. Pedragel said Granola's organic popularity among the tech crowd and diversifying use-cases has helped its user base grow 10% every week since its launch, though he didn't specify how many users it currently has. Off the back of that rapid growth and popularity, Granola on Wednesday said it has raised $43 million in a Series B funding round led by Nat Friedman and Daniel Gross's venture firm, NFDG, at a valuation of $250 million. The round also saw participation from existing investors Lightspeed and Spark, as well as angel investors including Vercel's Guillermo Rauch, Replit's Amjad Masad, Shopify's Tobi Lutke, and Linear's Karri Saarinen. The round brings the company's total funding raised to $67 million. Image Credits: Granola Alongside this funding, Granola is also extending its remit beyond its current single-user focus to make itself more useful for businesses: It's launching a new collaboration feature that lets users share transcripts and notes with teammates, and enable the app's AI take to advantage of a broader pool of notes and details to surface insights. Users in an organization can create custom folders for various collaborative use cases like sales calls, customer feedback and hiring. The app will also let users share meeting notes with people who don't use Granola to let them chat with its AI and ask it questions. Techcrunch event Join us at TechCrunch Sessions: AI Secure your spot for our leading AI industry event with speakers from OpenAI, Anthropic, and Cohere. For a limited time, tickets are just $292 for an entire day of expert talks, workshops, and potent networking. Exhibit at TechCrunch Sessions: AI Secure your spot at TC Sessions: AI and show 1,200+ decision-makers what you've built — without the big spend. Available through May 9 or while tables last. Berkeley, CA | REGISTER NOW Other meeting transcription and note-taking apps, such as Read AI, Fireflies and Otter, already offer similar shared space features. Pedregal, though, says Granola is for more than note-taking. 'I think how Granola differs from other notetakers is that it is very personal and you are in control all the time. You can edit notes at any point. It is not about just capturing a meeting, but it is a space where you can work, even post meetings,' he said. Earlier this month, Granola updated its app to enable users to ask the AI bot questions about all meetings it had recorded. Building on that, the company will now allow users to ask questions about specific folders as well. Image Credits: Granola Granola's new collaborative focus is part of a broader trend — many AI-powered meeting transcription and note-taking tools are expanding their focus and building integrations with other tools as they try to become a hub that stores and lets users search through knowledge from various sources. Meanwhile, productivity suites are introducing transcription tools to keep customers from having to use other apps for that purpose. For instance, Notion just yesterday launched an AI meeting note-taking tool. Lightspeed's Mike Mignano believes that Granola has an edge in this space because of its interface and user experience. 'Since the start, the company has had the right mix of AI transcript and human control of taking notes. Now that they are building context across the meetings and making the notes shareable, the product has become stronger. With these features, Granola will have long-term context for users and teams, kicking off network effects for the startup,' he said.
