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Appen (company)

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Appen Limited
FormerlyAppen Butler Hill
Company typePublic
IndustryTechnology
Founded1996; 29 years ago (1996)
FounderJulie Vonwiller Edit this on Wikidata
Headquarters
Bellevue, Washington
Area served
Worldwide
Key people
RevenueDecrease US$273.0 million (2023)
Number of employees
Decrease 1000 (2024)
Websiteappen.com
Footnotes / references
[1]

Appen Limited is a global company that develops datasets for building and improving artificial intelligence (AI). The company is based in Australia and publicly traded on the Australian Securities Exchange (ASX) under the code APX.[2]

History

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Appen was founded in Sydney in 1996 by linguist Dr. Julie Vonwiller.[3][4]

In 2011, Appen merged with the US-based Butler Hill Group to become Appen Butler Hill. Butler Hill had been founded in 1993 by Lisa Braden-Harder, [5] a former IBM Research employee who worked on grammar checking technology.

In 2012, Appen acquired Wikman Remer, a California based firm that developed tools and platforms for employee engagement, online moderation and curation.[6] The following year, Appen Butler Hill was re-branded as Appen and, on January 7, 2015, the company went public.

In October 2016, Appen acquired UK-based transcription services company Mendip Media Group (MMG).[7] Appen also acquired Leapforce in November 2017 adding additional capabilities in search relevance,[8][9] and, in 2019, Appen acquired Figure Eight.[10][11] In 2021, Appen announced it has signed an agreement to acquire Quadrant, a global leader in mobile location data, point-of-interest data, and corresponding compliance services.[12]

Operations

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Appen's customers use machine learning for a variety of use cases including automatic speech recognition (ASR), computer vision, increasing conversions in eCommerce, delivering more meaningful and personalized advertising, enhancing social media feeds or improving customer service capabilities with tools such as chatbots and virtual assistants.[13][better source needed]

Most of the company's revenues are earned offshore and its clients include eight of the top ten largest technology companies.[14][15][16]

At the end of 2017, the company's revenue was A$166.6 million and the company had more than 350 full-time employees and over 1,000,000 flexible workers in what is known as the "Appen crowd".[17][18][better source needed] Tasks are performed in more than 180 languages and 130 countries.[19]

Executive

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Appen was founded by linguist Dr. Julie Vonwiller. Vonwiller's husband Chris Vonwiller joined Appen in 2000 and is the company's Non-Executive Chairman of Appen.[19][20]

Lisa Braden-Harden served as CEO of Appen from the acquisition of Butler Hill Group in 2011 to 2015. In July 2015, Mark Brayan joined Appen as CEO,[citation needed] replacing Lisa Braden-Harder.[21] In December 2022, Armughan Ahmad succeeded Brayan as CEO and President of Appen.[22][23] On February 5, 2024, Ahmad resigned and was replaced as CEO by the company's COO, Ryan Kolln.[24]

Locations

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The company's corporate headquarters is in Chatswood, New South Wales, north of Sydney. The United States headquarters is in Bellevue, Washington, a suburb of Seattle, and there is also an office in Sunnyvale, California.

However, Appen has a global presence, with offices in Toronto, Beijing, China, Tokyo, as well as Cavite in the Philippines and Exeter, England.[25]

References

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  1. ^ Appen Limited (23 February 2021). "Appen 2020 Annual Report" (PDF). Archived (PDF) from the original on 2021-04-20. Retrieved 7 May 2021.
  2. ^ "Share Price & Information - ASX". www.asx.com.au. Retrieved 2018-07-06.
  3. ^ "Appen shares up 6 per cent, CEO tips search and self-driving cars as future growth drivers". Financial Review. 2016-02-29. Retrieved 2018-07-06.
  4. ^ "Julie Vonwiller: Executive Profile & Biography - Bloomberg". www.bloomberg.com. Retrieved 2018-07-06.
  5. ^ "APX.AU Company Profile & Executives - Appen Ltd. - Wall Street Journal". quotes.wsj.com. Retrieved 2018-07-06.
  6. ^ "Appen and Butler Hill Merge Operations To Create Global Leader in Linguistic Solutions | Technology Transactions". tmt-transactions.com. Archived from the original on 2018-11-26. Retrieved 2018-07-06.
  7. ^ Bullock, Lara (2016-10-10). "Tech company acquires transcription service provider". Lawyers Weekly. Retrieved 2018-07-06.
  8. ^ "Appen announcse [sic] strategic UK acquisition". Finance News Network. 2016-10-03. Retrieved 2018-07-06.
  9. ^ "Appen to acquire new acquisitions for US$80m". Finance News Network. 2017-11-29. Retrieved 2018-07-06.
  10. ^ "Figure Eight acquired by Appen". FinTech Futures. 23 April 2019. Archived from the original on 2019-04-23. Retrieved 2019-07-08.
  11. ^ "Australia – AI and machine learning platform Appen acquires Figure Eight". www2.staffingindustry.com. Retrieved 2019-07-08.
  12. ^ "Appen to Acquire Quadrant to Expand Mobile-Location Based Data Collection Offering". 25 August 2021.
  13. ^ Ireland, Kathy (May 12, 2017). "Enhancing the eCommerce Shopping Experience". Worldwide Business with Kathy Ireland. Retrieved 6 July 2018.
  14. ^ "Appen rides the rise of machine learning". Financial Review. 2017-05-26. Retrieved 2018-07-06.
  15. ^ "Thomson Reuters names the world's top 100 technology companies". Retrieved 2018-07-06.
  16. ^ "Mid-market awards finalist preview: Pronto Software, Appen, ITAC Services, Longwarry Food Park vie for $50-$100 million category". Financial Review. 2014-08-14. Archived from the original on 2017-02-28. Retrieved 2018-07-06.
  17. ^ Tan, Oliver. "How Does A Machine Learn?". Forbes. Retrieved 2018-07-06.
  18. ^ "Building Culture in Language Services Companies: An interview with Mark Brayan, CEO of Appen". Retrieved 2018-07-06.
  19. ^ a b "Appen 2017 Annual Report" (PDF). Australian Securities Exchange (ASX). April 17, 2018. Retrieved July 6, 2018.
  20. ^ "Profit up 28 per cent at web search specialist Appen". Financial Review. 2015-08-28. Retrieved 2018-07-06.
  21. ^ "Butler Hill Group completes merger with Appen, Inc". www.cartermorse.com. Archived from the original on 2018-10-10. Retrieved 2018-07-06.
  22. ^ "Newly Appointed Appen CEO and President To Accelerate Next Wave of Enterprise AI Adoption" (Press release). The Eagle-Tribune. 9 January 2023. Archived from the original on 9 January 2023. Retrieved 14 February 2024.
  23. ^ Swan, David (21 March 2023). "'I beat my friends to the opportunity': Appen CEO relishing turnaround task". The Australian. Retrieved 14 February 2024.
  24. ^ Lam, Joseph (6 February 2024). "Appen CEO Armughan Ahmad's sudden departure". The Australian. Retrieved 14 February 2024.
  25. ^ "Appen Outperforms in 2017, Breaks Through Billion Dollar Valuation | Slator". Slator. 2018-02-23. Retrieved 2018-07-06.
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