10web: Revolutionizing WordPress with AI

10web, an Armenian startup, leads in using generative AI by providing a user-friendly platform for crafting WordPress website creation.

Website development is only one of several fields where generative AI has significantly increased efficiency. Tools like Wix and Relume, both bootstrapped businesses, make it easy to describe your website’s style and layout using simple instructions. A new participant in the competition, 10web, hails from Armenia and claims to have the upper hand.

With 10web, users can easily create WordPress websites using text prompts. WordPress is a popular content management system, but it may be challenging for novices to use. Since WordPress is open-source, unlike Wix and Squarespace, it lacks hosting services and comes with a lot of capabilities that demand significant web design skills. Users also have to handle a lot more backend duties.

W3Techs estimates that, due to its customizable features, WordPress is still used by roughly 40% of all websites on the internet. The second-place finisher was Shopify, a Canadian startup that helps suppliers construct their web stores instead of depending on Amazon. This is happening during a surge in direct-to-consumer shopping.

The Yerevan-based technical team at 10web has made WordPress more user-friendly by incorporating generative AI models such as Stable Diffusion, Llama 2, and GPT-4. The co-founder of 10web and CEO of Krisp, a business that uses machine learning to eliminate ambient noise from audio, Arto Minasyan, commented that “architecturally, building a platform for WordPress is not easy” when asked about the amount of work required to create such a tool.

To host effectively, you need a solid foundation. If you want WordPress uptime, backups, and security, you need a managed service. Every one of those websites is essentially an instance, so it’s really difficult to do all of that, he said. “On the other hand, when you’re using a closed source platform like Wix or Squarespace, all you have to do is create a single backend and then generate pages for every website.”

With an open-source community of over two million developers, Minasyan is certain that improving WordPress’s usability will yield results in due time. Having started in 2017, 10web is now profitable. Approximately 20,000 of its users are paying clients (Minasyan pointed out that some SMB customers can have hundreds of websites). So far, 10web has been used to create 1.5 million websites.

10web offers two revenue models: per website or per user. Users will be able to bill their consumers using its planned payment system, with 10web taking a commission.

Presently, the company’s annual recurring revenue (ARR) is $5 million, and according to Minasyan, it’s projected to reach $25 million by the end of next year. The creator said that the business was able to expand in part because of its advantageous location in Armenia. Armenia, like many other countries that were once part of the Soviet Union, has access to a cheap and plentiful supply of engineering talent.

Armenian AI skill is likely four times less expensive than American talent. The founder speculated that this is the place to get top AI talent. “However, finding top talent is challenging for web builders in California due to the intense competition from companies like Google, Amazon, and OpenAI.”

Picsart, the first unicorn in Armenia, was born in the country’s emerging tech hub, which serves as an example for other businesses. Many Armenian businesspeople have gone global, with the United States being a popular destination, due to the country’s modest economy. The 70-person crew at 10web follows a similar strategy: they hire engineers in Armenia to tap on the country’s abundant technological expertise, while they staff up in the US with marketing and business development experts. Naturally, it can be helpful to fundraising efforts to have a presence in the United States.

The founder noted that the majority of Armenian businesses aim to tap into the American market. “You can approach Armenian VCs for smaller amounts; however, if you require seed funding of a couple million dollars or Series A funding of tens of millions of dollars, you will have to look to the United States.”