E-commerce startup Dukaan has replaced 90 per cent of its customer support team with an artificial intelligence (AI) chatbot, founder and CEO Suumit Shah informed on Tuesday.
Attributing the decision to prioritising profitability, he said customer support costs reduced by 85 per cent while resolution time went down from over two hours to three minutes.
“We had to lay off 90 per cent of our support team because of this AI chatbot. Tough? Yes. Necessary? Absolutely,” Shah tweeted.
Several Twitter users criticised the tweet, deeming it insensitive.
“Given the state of economy, startups are prioritising “profitability” over striving to become “unicorns”, and so are we,” Shah added.
He explained in detail about Lina, the AI assistant which he claimed, replaces generic and delayed responses, as well as limited availability of resources and poor communication. After 12 tweets, Shah said that the company is hiring for multiple roles.
When asked by a Twitter user about the assistance provided to the laid off staff, he asked them to look out for his LinkedIn post, reiterating that it was a tough decision.
“As expected, ‘someone’ will get offended on behalf of ‘someone else’, so I had this reply ready: Assistance ke bare mein jab Linkedin pe post karunga tab dekh lena mere dost, yahaan Twitter pe log “profitability” dekhte hai “sympathy” nahi”, Shah tweeted.
“Laying off is never a pleasant experience, why is the need to proclaim and be proud about it,” a Twitter user wrote.
The announcement comes after Union Minister of State for Electronics and IT Rajeev Chandrasekhar deemed any concerns about AI threatening jobs as “nonsense”.
(Only the headline and picture of this report may have been reworked by the Business Standard staff; the rest of the content is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
Stay connected with us on social media platform for instant update click here to join our Twitter, & Facebook
We are now on Telegram. Click here to join our channel (@TechiUpdate) and stay updated with the latest Technology headlines.
For all the latest Business News Click Here
For the latest news and updates, follow us on Google News.
Denial of responsibility! NewsAzi is an automatic aggregator around the global media. All the content are available free on Internet. We have just arranged it in one platform for educational purpose only. In each content, the hyperlink to the primary source is specified. All trademarks belong to their rightful owners, all materials to their authors. If you are the owner of the content and do not want us to publish your materials on our website, please contact us by email – [email protected]. The content will be deleted within 24 hours.
