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Hotshot

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Creative platform focused on capturing imagination through various themes

New York City, United StatesFounded 2017AI
Valuation $50–100M Last recorded · 2021
Headcount <100 Current team size
Total funding $10–50M Disclosed equity funding
Unlock exact values This page shows ranges. Dealroom has the exact numbers for Hotshot and the history behind them.

About Hotshot

Hotshot.co has emerged as a player in the generative artificial intelligence space, focusing on text-to-video creation. The company was co-founded by CEO Aakash Sastry, who previously served as the CEO of the avatar creator Itsme, and Jon Mullan. Initially developing photo editing tools, the company pivoted its focus to video generation.

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The firm's core product is an AI-powered platform that transforms text prompts into short video clips, typically five to ten seconds in length. The technology is capable of producing videos with a resolution of 720p and can render a variety of artistic styles, from realistic scenes to animations. A notable aspect of the platform is its capacity to capture and convey nuanced human emotions in its video outputs. The service operates on a freemium model; it provides a free tier that allows users to generate a limited number of videos daily without requiring an account, a strategy that lowers the barrier to entry. For users with greater needs, paid subscription plans are available, offering a higher volume of video generations and access to additional features.

Hotshot.co targets a broad user base, including content creators, marketers, and filmmakers, who can use the tool for social media content, pre-visualization, and storyboarding. The company's technology is built upon a foundation of three video models—Hotshot-XL, Hotshot Act One, and Hotshot—trained on a vast dataset. In March 2025, Hotshot was acquired by xAI. The acquisition led to the integration of the Hotshot team and its technology into xAI's operations, with Hotshot ceasing new video creation on its platform shortly after the announcement.

Source: Dealroom company data

At a glance

Status
Acquired
Founded
2017
Headquarters
New York City, United States
Employees
18
Open positions
None listed
Dealroom signal
75.9/100
Industry
Media, Enterprise Software
Sector
AI, Core AI, Generative AI
Technology
Artificial Intelligence
Business model
SaaS
Client focus
b2b

Funding history

2 recorded events

Company financing events and reported valuations.

Deal typeDateAmountValuationInvestorsSource
ACQUISITION✓Exit Mar 2025 $0 — xAI ↗
SERIES A✓Equity / VC Apr 2021 $15M $61M Allen & Company · Seven Seven Six · Third Kind Venture Capital · Scott Belsky —
Showing the latest 2 of 2 recorded eventsBook a demo for the full funding history →

Growth signals

Hotshot website traffic

Latest recorded traffic for Hotshot is 28K monthly website visits, up 86.7% over the last three months. Hotshot's team grew 12.5% over the past year.

Latest monthly visits28K 3-month web change+86.7% 1-year team growth+12.5%
Summary metrics are public; monthly history is available with a demoCompare with peers →

Investments and acquisitions

Capital deployed

Recent portfolio relationships for companies that also act as investors or acquirers.

Investors

10 investors on the cap table

From Dealroom's funding and investor records, grouped by the round each investor first entered.

Series A5 investors entered at this stage

Other known investors5 additional known investors

Team profiled 6 named & role-tagged
Founders Hidden — book a demo/100 quality score
Key operators 2 quality Hidden — book a demo/100
Potential founders Hidden — book a demo likely future founders
Startup mafia Hidden — book a demo alumni-founded startups
Talent movements Hidden — book a demo in · Hidden — book a demo out past 12 months

Source: Dealroom Talent Intelligence.

Global footprint

Workforce and web traffic by country
Workforce by country
2 countries with
team presence
🇨🇦 Canada50%
🇺🇸 United States50%
2 countries shown

Market sentiment

Posts on X, past 7 days

An AI-synthesised read of the highest-engagement posts about Hotshot on X, ranked by likes and reposts, corporate channels excluded.

Reading the room on X — pulling top posts and synthesizing themes…

Source: X recent search ranked by engagement (likes + retweets) · Synthesis by Claude · Cached for 1 hour

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