Editing ElevenLabs (section)

== History and Founding ==

ElevenLabs was co-founded in 2022 by Piotr Dąbkowski, a former Google machine learning engineer, and Mateusz Staniszewski, an ex-Palantir deployment strategist. Both founders, originally from Poland, reportedly drew inspiration from the poor quality of film dubbing they experienced while watching American movies in their home country.<ref>https://venturebeat.com/ai/now-hear-this-voice-cloning-ai-startup-elevenlabs-nabs-19m-from-a16z-and-other-heavy-hitters</ref>

The founders first met as teenagers at Copernicus High School in Warsaw before pursuing separate academic paths—Dąbkowski studying at Oxford and Cambridge, while Staniszewski studied mathematics in London. Their shared vision of making quality content accessible across all languages led to the creation of ElevenLabs as a research-first company.<ref>https://research.contrary.com/company/elevenlabs</ref>

The company launched its beta platform in January 2023, quickly gaining traction with over one million users within five months. This rapid adoption demonstrated market demand for high-quality AI voice synthesis technology.<ref>https://research.contrary.com/company/elevenlabs</ref>