India’s Pocket FM doubles revenue run rate to $500M as AI powers 93% of audio content

Pocket FM has reported a rapid revenue climb as it leans heavily on artificial intelligence to produce audio stories. The company says its annualized revenue run rate rose from about $250 million a year ago to $430 million in April and now stands at $500 million, a figure the startup calculates by annualizing monthly revenue. Co‑founder and CEO Rohan Nayak told TechCrunch that AI now supports the majority of the platform’s library and almost all newly produced material.

The company emphasizes that humans still drive creative direction while AI handles large-scale production tasks. Pocket FM’s AI lead, Vasu Sharma, a former Meta and Tesla scientist, says the startup has trained proprietary models for functions such as creative writing and text‑to‑speech using years of production data and listener engagement signals. Nayak described the current approach as building AI tools around creators rather than replacing the storytelling instincts of human writers.

Economics have been a major motivator: Pocket FM estimates AI has made content production about 80 times cheaper and radically accelerated output. Tasks that once took about a year to produce 100 hours of content can now be completed in a day, the company said. The platform’s creator base of more than 550,000 people is producing roughly 2.5 million hours of AI‑powered content annually, up from a total catalog of about 100,000 hours two years ago; Pocket FM now hosts over 770,000 audio series.

That surge in supply has been matched by improvements in listener metrics and diversification of revenue. Pocket FM’s 12‑month revenue retention rate rose to 76% from 44% two years prior, a change the company attributes in part to a broader slate of stories matching varied tastes. The startup reports more than 250 million listeners across 20+ countries, with the U.S. now its largest market — accounting for roughly 70% of the annualized run rate and growing about 70% over the past year. Of the $500 million run rate, about $85 million comes from advertising and the remaining roughly $415 million from users paying to unlock individual episodes.

Pocket Entertainment, the parent company, is pushing the same AI-driven model beyond audio. Its Pocket Saga microdrama app, launched three months ago and available in the U.S., is entirely AI‑produced and has reached an annualized run rate of about $15 million. The company is also repurposing successful audio stories into AI‑generated videos for the app, without traditional live‑action production. Pocket Entertainment says it plans to enter at least two more entertainment formats over the next five years and pursue licensing deals to adapt hits into books, TV and film.

On the corporate side, the Bengaluru- and Culver City-based company said it is profitable on an adjusted basis and is in talks with investors about a potential $100–120 million raise at a reported valuation near $2 billion; Nayak declined to confirm specifics and said the business is not under immediate pressure to raise capital. He added the proceeds, if raised, would likely be used to further invest in AI and expand into new formats. Pocket Entertainment does not plan to go public within the next 24 months but is keeping options open for a future listing in India or the U.S.