Obsess over the customer problem, not the hype. Technology shifts, but human problems are remarkably stable.
What inspired you to start Parloa, and how has your vision for the company evolved since its founding?
In 2016, Stefan and I started Future of Voice because we were obsessed with what voice could unlock. Speech-to-text was finally getting good, and we were among the first in Germany building for the early Amazon Alexa ecosystem. Very quickly, we saw the gap: enterprises had no reliable, scalable way to bring voice AI into their contact centers. That’s why we leveraged all of our learnings from our agency days & founded Parloa in 2018.
Since then, the vision has expanded. We began with a simple promise make AI agents as easy to talk to as a friend. Today, Parloa powers agentic AI for some of the world’s most customer-obsessed enterprises, helping them build and manage solutions that deepen relationships with every interaction. I’m proud that we’re recognized as one of the leaders in this space, but even more so of the trust our customers place in us.
How do you differentiate Parloa in an increasingly competitive AI customer service landscape, and what do you believe sets your approach apart from other conversational AI platforms?
Three things set Parloa apart.
First, we’re voice-first and agentic by design. Most platforms bolt generative AI onto legacy workflows, while we started from the other side. Decisions, reasoning, and actions are driven by LLMs, and we add strict guardrails wherever compliance demands it. The result is flexibility when you want it and precision when you need it.
Second, we’re built for the enterprise, full stop. Today we support two of the world’s top ten retailers and three of the top twenty insurers, alongside global BPOs and partners like TP and NTT. These organizations have zero tolerance for downtime and extremely strict customer journey requirements, and we consistently meet that bar.
Finally, we’re democratizing the building & management of AI agents across the entire enterprise, lowering the barriers and removing the roadblocks that slow global deployment, while also increasing reliability and performance.
How do you see the role of AI-agents in transforming the customer experience landscape; especially in industries like healthcare, financial services, and utilities where Parloa is active?
The last two years changed the baseline. Customers now expect digital and voice self-service that actually understands them and gets things done. In high-trust industries, that shift is huge.
Agentic AI brings always-on, personalized, and even preemptive support – helping a patient manage care, resolving a billing issue in minutes, or proactively explaining a power outage. These aren’t just service moments; they’re chances to build confidence and long-term loyalty.
Trust, security, and compliance are clearly central at Parloa (e.g. SOC 2, HIPAA, PCI DSS etc.). How do you balance innovation / speed with those stringent compliance requirements?
Compliance and data privacy are always front of mind – the end customer needs to feel secure when being supported by AI agents. At Parloa, we don’t see security and innovation as competing priorities. Our enterprise customers trust us with their most critical customer relationships, so compliance is a foundation in our product development, not an afterthought. We engineer with security and privacy baked into every layer, from architecture to deployment, so teams can innovate with confidence at scale. By combining enterprise-grade compliance with an agile approach to development, we ensure speed never comes at the expense of trust.
With the rapid rise of AI agents and voice-first interfaces, what emerging trends do you think will reshape customer communication in the next few years, and how is Parloa preparing for them?
AI agents are becoming the new interface for customer communication, reshaping the entire journey with personalized relationships at scale. At Parloa, we’re leading this shift with the world’s first multimodal conversational platform, intuitive tools like Agent Builder Wizard, A/B Testing and Prompt Assist, and innovations like Agent Composition for global scale. Our mission is simple: empower every business to build, optimize, and scale AI agent teams for the next decade.
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How do you design for empathy in AI agents? What strategies or technologies do you use to ensure interactions feel authentic and personalized rather than robotic?
Important to note: empathy is the interface, not a feature. We design AI agents to listen actively, adapt in real time, and remember what matters for each customer. Our reinforcement learning and predictive models refine responses continuously, so conversations feel natural (because, in a programmatic sense, they are). Empathy also comes from the little things in conversation: recalling a preference, adjusting tone, or anticipating a need before it’s said. With nuance in mind, that’s how we’re evolving customer/brand interactions from a simple exchange into the start of a meaningful relationship.
What is your approach to hiring and building a strong team, especially in areas like NLP, security, and user experience? How do you maintain alignment around the product mission as the team grows?
We hire the way we build: precision, empathy, and clarity of vision. Great forward-deployed engineers, security experts, and designers bring skill and mindset. We look for people motivated by our mission to deepen customer relationships with agentic AI.
Alignment comes from a clear North Star. Whether you’re in engineering, marketing, or customer success, the question is the same: Does this decision help companies build more meaningful relationships with their customers? If the answer’s yes, we’re on the right track.
What key lessons from your journey at Parloa would you share with aspiring founders who are looking to build and scale a deep tech startup ?
First, trust is your currency, with customers, investors, and your team at-large. Earn it early and protect it. Second, obsess over the customer problem, not the hype. Technology shifts, but human problems are remarkably stable. For us, it’s fixing the broken business/customer relationship. Finally, scale culture as deliberately as you scale product. The teams that win in tech believe in the future they’re building together, and that belief shows up in how they ship, support customers, and challenge each other every day.
Thanks, Kosub!
About Malte Kosub,
Malte Kosub is CEO & Co-Founder of Parloa.
About Parloa,
Parloa is a pioneering global AI company dedicated to transforming customer interactions into seamless, human-like conversations. With its advanced AI Agent Management Platform, Parloa empowers enterprises to automate contact centers while maintaining meaningful, personalized engagement. By harnessing the full potential of generative AI, the platform enables highly skilled AI agents to conduct natural and unique conversations with each customer, while providing AI-powered support to human agents when needed. Trusted by leading global brands, Parloa helps businesses enhance customer satisfaction, boost sales, and foster loyalty through exceptional service experiences. Founded in 2018 by Malte Kosub and Stefan Ostwald, Parloa operates from its offices in Berlin, Munich, and New York, serving companies worldwide with innovative AI solutions for modern customer engagement.
