AI voice agents and self-driving cars share similarities in terms of performance evaluation, according to Brooke Hopkins, a former tech lead at Waymo. Hopkins has founded Coval, a startup that aims to apply the same testing practices used for self-driving cars to AI voice and chat agents.
Hopkins noticed common challenges across the AI industry after leaving Waymo and decided to launch Coval in 2024. The platform builds simulations to test how agents perform tasks, such as making reservations or handling customer service queries. Coval’s technology offers a standardized set of metrics for evaluation but also allows companies to customize their criteria and detect regressions.
Coval assists companies in showcasing the capabilities of their agents to customers with confidence. Hopkins emphasized the need for companies to ensure that agents perform as expected and not merely as a demo to win over enterprise clientele. The seed funding of $3.3 million led by MaC Venture Capital will support Coval’s growth in engineering and product-market fit development.
As the demand for AI agents continues to rise, Coval aims to differentiate itself by leveraging Hopkins’ extensive experience in the field. With an early start and a wealth of knowledge from past projects, Coval is poised to stand out in the competitive landscape of AI agent evaluation.
