Marketing Professionals’ AI Version of Canva?
In 2024, a mysterious image model named “red_panda” surpassed OpenAI’s DALL-E and Midjourney in ratings on the AI analysis platform Artificial Analysis, attracting industry attention. Everyone is asking: who created this model?
New model on top of Artificial Analysis Image Arena: red_panda.
It beats Flux 1.1 pro, ideogram v2, and midjourney v6.1 byu/Gothsim10insingularity
The mysterious image model named red_panda has outperformed OpenAI’s DALL-E and Midjourney on the AI analysis platform Artificial Analysis. As time progressed, the startup behind it emerged: Recraft, which announced on May 5, U.S. time, the completion of a $30 million Series B funding round, led by venture capital firm Accel, with Khosla Ventures and Madrona participating.
Anna Veronika Dorogush, founder and CEO of Recraft, revealed that the initial model was named “red_panda” because early users continuously generated adorable panda images. Recraft’s AI model specializes in generating promotional images such as posters or brochures for brands, making it akin to a “marketing AI version of Canva.” It has achieved an annual recurring revenue (ARR) of $5 million and has 4 million users.
Recraft: AI Image Generation Tool Designed for Designers, Attracts 300,000 Users in 8 Months
Recraft is a generative AI tool designed specifically for brands and image designers, capable of generating and editing design elements, icons, 3D images, and illustrations while maintaining brand style. Recraft’s unique feature is that it can generate not only raster graphics but also scalable vector images that are easy to edit, which is crucial for designers. For example, today a designer can easily apply a company logo to a curved cup using Recraft and can edit it freely or adjust it according to the brand’s color palette. This versatility sets Recraft apart.
Recraft not only generates raster graphics but also creates scalable vector images that are easy to edit.
Image / Recraft Official Website
After being established for just 8 months in 2023, Recraft garnered the favor of 300,000 users and raised $12 million in Series A funding in 2024, jointly led by Khosla Ventures and former GitHub CEO Nat Friedman.
The origin of all this began with Anna Veronika Dorogush’s sister. “She is a designer, and during the design process, I noticed one thing: she spent a lot of time on tracing, and I immediately realized this could be automated.” Anna Veronika Dorogush stated in an interview with the media outlet Maddyness that he derived three key points from his sister’s work:
- Vector graphics are very important in design.
- Designers’ designs need to have a consistent style.
- For designers, it is usually necessary to generate “a set” of design images, not just a single one.
Anna Veronika Dorogush explained that the current limitation of most generative AI is the inability to perform post-production and editing. Therefore, Recraft specifically focuses on generating vector graphics as its main output while also requiring the model to produce style-consistent image sets for ease of use by designers.
Testing: Can Input Instructions in Traditional Chinese, Mockup Performance Unsatisfactory
After testing the free version, the operation and user interface of Recraft are quite similar to Canva. The difference is that there is no need to start from scratch; users can simply upload an image or input commands for the AI to generate the desired image to begin designing. All command inputs on Recraft can currently be done in Chinese, and what impresses with Recraft is its ability to handle long instructions, although long instructions perform better in English. However, the commonly used Mockup function for poster design or product promotion does not perform satisfactorily on Recraft, for example, printing logos on faces.
The journalist tested Recraft, which supports Traditional Chinese, but the Mockup function’s performance is not ideal.
Image / Startup Gathering Self-Made
In comparison, the free version allows generating only 2 images per month, while the basic, advanced, and professional plans at $10, $27, and $48 per year offer more image generation quotas and advanced features, including more detailed image editing, color style conversion, and more.
Image Generation Speed Twice as Fast as OpenAI’s DALL-E 3
Anna Veronika Dorogush has a background in mathematics and engineering and has worked at Microsoft, Google, and Yandex. The open-source machine learning algorithm CatBoost, used for search engines and recommendation systems, was developed by him.
Recraft founder Anna Veronika Dorogush has worked at Microsoft, Google, and Yandex, laying a strong technical and practical foundation.
Image / Anna Veronika Dorogush LinkedIn
Confident in his technical capabilities, Anna Veronika Dorogush chose to develop his own foundational model rather than using open-source models to build the product—subsequently proving that their model is indeed competitive. In evaluations on the AI analysis platform Artificial Analysis, Recraft received positive reviews, and its image generation speed is 7 seconds, twice as fast as OpenAI’s DALL-E 3.
Anna Veronika Dorogush admitted that he could have started his entrepreneurial journey earlier, “I have market sensitivity, product capability, and can manage a team… but I always felt I needed to learn more before starting my own business. Now I think that is wrong; the best way to learn is to do what you want to do, at least in entrepreneurship.”
This article is jointly reproduced from: Startup Gathering
The initial draft of this article was written by AI
Sources: TechCrunch, TechBlast, Maddyness, VentureBeat