Velvet

What do they actually do

Velvet is a web-based video editor that puts AI generation (text-to-video, image-to-video, and AI voice) and conventional editing in one workspace. It supports multiple generative models (examples include Veo, Sora, and ElevenLabs), so teams can create variations, make standard timeline edits, and keep brand assets consistent without jumping between separate tools velvet.video, YC company page.

It’s a live product with paid plans (e.g., a $130/month tier) plus an enterprise plan that advertises team features, compliance controls, and 24/7 Slack support. Teams can sign up or request a demo from the website velvet.video.

Who are their target customer(s)

• In-house marketing and creative teams at brands: They need to produce many on-brand video ads quickly in a single place while keeping logos, fonts, and messaging consistent, instead of juggling multiple tools velvet.video, YC company page.
• Growth and paid-social managers: They A/B test hooks and need dozens of short creatives fast; switching between separate generation tools and an editor slows iteration and raises costs velvet.video, YC company page.
• Creative agencies and production houses: They produce videos for multiple clients and want to reduce post-production overhead with templates, bulk exports, and a way to scale output without more headcount or stitching tools together tooljunction, velvet.video.
• Enterprise brand/compliance teams: They must control approvals, permissions, and audit trails to manage regulatory and brand-safety risk and prefer enterprise controls and dedicated support velvet.video.
• Small teams of AI video pros and creators: They prefer a unified workspace for generation + editing to avoid managing multiple model UIs, voice tools, and an external NLE, enabling faster experimentation YC company page, velvet.video.

How would they acquire their first 10, 50, and 100 customers

• First 10: High-touch pilots via founders’ and YC networks: recruit 8–12 brands/agencies for short paid pilots with hands-on onboarding, a single point of contact, and Slack support; capture case studies and demo clips for proof velvet.video.
• First 50: Productize the pilot into a one-page offer and run targeted LinkedIn outreach/webinars for growth managers; onboard 2–3 agency partners to resell templates and bulk-export workflows; add an SDR/AE to convert inbound.
• First 100: Open a low-friction free trial with starter credits and vertical templates; publish SEO/how-to content and list on tool directories; ship integrations to ad platforms/storage; add small outbound for mid-market and one enterprise AE.

What is the rough total addressable market

Top-down context:

Analysts size the global AI video generator market at about $615M in 2024, growing quickly Fortune Business Insights. The broader demand driver—global digital video ad spend—was roughly $191B in 2024 and is projected to keep growing Statista, IAB.

Bottom-up calculation:

Starting from ~$191B in 2024 digital video ad spend, assume 10–30% goes to creative/production and 5–15% of that becomes software/tooling as workflows shift to AI-enabled tools—yielding a practical software TAM of about $1B–$9B today Statista, Vidico.

Assumptions:

• Creative/production is ~10–30% of digital video campaign budgets Vidico.
• Software/tooling can capture ~5–15% of production budgets as teams adopt AI workflows.
• Adoption shifts a meaningful share of agency/studio work to in-house tools over the next few years.

Who are some of their notable competitors

• Runway: A full creative suite that combines high-quality text/image/video generators with an in-browser editor and team features, enabling generation and editing in one product—overlapping heavily with Velvet’s workflow focus.
• Descript: A text-first audio/video editor with strong AI features (transcripts, voice cloning, clip generation) tuned for rapid iteration; less focused on cinematic gen models but a popular all-in-one editor for small teams.
• Synthesia: Enterprise-oriented AI video platform built around templates, avatars, localization, and governance—competes on the “single platform for teams” promise with strong compliance and brand controls.
• Adobe (Firefly + Premiere Pro): Adobe is embedding Firefly video generation and AI editing into Creative Cloud and Premiere Pro, offering brand controls and workflow continuity for enterprises already standardized on Adobe Firefly, Premiere AI.
• Pika Labs: A fast, experimental text-to-video generator producing stylized clips; focuses on raw generation quality rather than team collaboration, brand kits, or enterprise editing workflows.