This Founder Bet Against the ChatGPT Hype. Now Her ‘Boring’ AI Startup Is Worth $1.9 Billion

Instead of chasing consumer buzz, Writer founder May Habib built AI agents designed for regulated industries.

BY LEILA SHERIDAN, NEWS WRITER

May Habib, co-founder of Writer. Photography by Evelyn Freja

Artificial intelligence exploded into public consciousness through consumer tools like ChatGPT. But for entrepreneur May Habib, the real opportunity wasn’t in viral chatbots. It was in strategically trained AI agents built for business teams.

Habib launched Writer in early 2020, positioning it as an enterprise AI platform designed to power complex business processes inside regulated industries. Days later, however, the world shut down. Markets plummeted, corporate budgets froze, and offices emptied as COVID-19 spread globally. 

“It was an insane year but also a very trauma-bonding one,” Habib told Inc. of Writer’s launch.

While many startups pulled back, Habib doubled down. Her belief was that large organizations wouldn’t adopt AI through novelty. Instead, they would adopt it through governance, security, and integration, qualities Writer could offer.

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In 2022, Writer launched its own proprietary language models, developed over several years by cofounder and CTO Waseem AlShikh. Unlike public large language models, Writer’s systems were designed specifically for enterprise use. They’re trained with industry-specific governance and compliance frameworks in mind and allow companies to connect internal data, systems, and brand guidelines to build customized AI agents.

For highly regulated industries—healthcare, finance, pharmaceuticals—plugging sensitive data into public AI systems raises compliance and liability concerns. Writer’s pitch is that enterprise AI must be controlled and aligned with internal policy from the start.

Habib pitches enterprises directly, presenting specific use cases, compliance considerations, and insight into where she thinks AI is headed next. As a result, Writer now has roughly 300 enterprise customers, including Qualcomm, AstraZeneca, Cigna, Prudential, and Vanguard.

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