John Kim | Source | Co-Founder and CEO at Sendbird at John Kim
John Kim
John Kim is the Co-Founder and CEO of Sendbird (YC W16), a B2B startup providing a messaging solution for enterprises. The platform currently serves millions of monthly active users and helps businesses build 1-on-1 messaging and group chat quickly on their applications. Sendbird has raised over $120M to-date, backed by Y Combinator, Shasta Ventures, August Capital, ICONIQ Capital, Tiger Global Management, and FundersClub. John also serves as a General Partner at Valon Capital, a venture capital firm focusing on B2B/SaaS/AI, deep tech, fintech, and health care.
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John Kim (https://sendbird.com/)
Co-Founder and CEO at Sendbird
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Sendbird launches in-app business messaging, dashboard | TechTarget
Sendbird releases business messaging feature set for customers such as Walgreens to manage cross-channel communications and notifications.
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Why the future of community is in your company’s own app
With Gen Z migrating to new social media, companies should focus on building communities in-app rather than depending on other platforms.
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AI Protocol Standardization: A New Era of Interoperability
John highlights the shift towards interoperable AI ecosystems with protocols like A2A and MCP, likening them to APIs in traditional software. He emphasizes the strategic importance for CIOs to adopt these protocols for future AI collaboration. Alternatives like IBM's ACP are emerging, but the focus remains on how enterprises will adapt to AI-driven communication and representation. -
CIOs and CTOs Embrace AI Agents, Practitioners Remain Cautious
John notes that CIOs and CTOs view AI agents as "a force multiplier" for productivity and cost reduction. Practitioners, however, face "data quality issues, model reliability," and integration challenges, leading to caution. Bridging this gap involves effective change management, clear communication, and showcasing early successes to align both groups on AI's potential. -
Unlocking Career Success with Myers-Briggs Insights
John emphasizes that understanding our "operating systems" through Myers-Briggs can help identify roles that align with our natural tendencies. In South Korea, where Myers-Briggs is culturally ingrained, this tool is pivotal for career alignment. John believes that in today's job market, finding the right fit is crucial for career fulfillment.
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Sendbird released an AI-powered chatbot last month to go with its messaging platform that can ingest a company's customer service, sales and marketing data. The company is large language model-agnostic and is more interested in providing customers with the capability of using LLMs as opposed to building its own, said cofounder and CEO John S. Kim.
"We're not bringing the brains to you -- we have partnered with all the brains," Kim said. "We're providing all the other tools for you to fully operationalize AI in production."
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Sendbird’s solution involves an in-app messaging capability designed to improve the impersonal experience of email and text messaging and control the identity risks associated with communication via legacy SMS platforms. The issue that Kim and his co-founders identified was that the vast majority of businesses, such as PicPay, could not spend resources to build a custom frictionless, modern experience in messaging applications.
“We want to help the 99.9% of businesses around the world who don’t have the technology or user experience expertise in messaging,” Kim explained. “We help our customers harness the power of modern messaging capabilities and embed it into their own platforms so they can retain their users and engage with them in the context of what their business is about.”