A startup called WaveForms AI is looking to transform audio-based artificial intelligence interactions after closing on a bumper $40 million seed funding round.

Today’s round was led by Andreessen Horowitz and values WaveForms AI at a staggering $200 million right off the bat. The investment doesn’t just underline the confidence in the startup, but also illustrates the growing interest in AI voice technology and the potential for more lifelike human-to-machine interactions.

WaveForms AI is led by former OpenAI researcher Alexi Conneau. It sets itself apart from other startups by focusing exclusively on AI voices that can understand and respond to emotional cues. It’s aiming to create AI experiences very different from the traditional text-based interactions people have with ChatGPT and other chatbots.

Conneau told Fortune that he’s looking to create more seamless and natural experiences for people when they interact with AI, and to that end his company is focused on creating technology that can mimic humanlike conversations. He has the skills and experience to do this, having previously led the development of ChatGPT’s voice capabilities while working at OpenAI.

WaveForms AI’s laser focus on audio large language models will lead to the development of AI bots that can interpret the intricacies of human emotions during conversations, Conneau said. Whereas traditional chatbots are reliant on text inputs, WaveForms AI wants to create digital assistants that can engage with their users in a more intuitive, natural and dynamic way. It aims to make communication with AI more sophisticated, so chatbots can react to the emotional context of conversations they have with people.

There are vast and varied potential implications for this kind of technology. It can result in more lifelike and emotionally intelligent responses from chatbots, increasing user engagement and satisfaction. It could also pave the way for more personalized and empathetic interactions, enabling AI systems to pick up on emotional cues and respond in a more appropriate way. If it works as Conneau hopes, it may soon transform consumer expectations around AI, increasing the demand for more humanlike qualities in AI-powered applications.

Conneau told Fortune that the inspiration for WaveForms AI’s technology comes from the movie “Her,” which tells the story of a man’s increasingly passionate relationship with an AI assistant called Samantha. “When they see the technology, they think about the movie right away,” Conneau said of the company’s AI voices.

His work at OpenAI attracted some controversy, as one of the voices he created for ChatGPT bore a striking resemblance to the actress Scarlett Johansson, who played the role of Samantha in “Her.” Johansson later revealed she had been asked to license her voice for the project, but refused to do so, and later threatened to take legal action against OpenAI.

With WaveForms AI, Conneau said, he wants to push the boundaries of what audio AI can be, saying that he sees it as the “social-emotional layer” of artificial general intelligence, which is a vision of a future AI system that can do certain things as well as humans. His goal, he said, is to enhance the ability of AI to understand and respond to human language, so it can interpret details such as tone, inflection and accents.

For instance, WaveForms AI’s audio LLMs will be able to capture the emotional subtleties of human voices, understand what they imply in the context of the conversation, and then reply while conveying their own emotions in return.

This could result in some interesting applications, Conneau believes, such as an audio LLM for teaching that can detect when a student is frustrated, and respond by adopting a more patient approach.

According to Conneau, the startup is planning to release a “consumer software product” that’s focused on the emotional connection between users and AI systems, but he didn’t provide any more details than this.

“The idea is to create new, more immersive experiences with AI, ones that feel more enjoyable,” he told Reuters in a another interview. “There are many companies right now that are focusing on superintelligence, but not so much on the quality of the human-computer interaction.”

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