Founded in 2022 by Hasan Sukkar, 11x has quickly risen in the tech industry, claiming to approach $10 million in annualized recurring revenue (ARR) just two years post-launch. Specializing in AI-powered outbound cold sales solutions, the company moved its headquarters from London to San Francisco last July. This swift rise has come with its share of drama and dissent. Claims ranging from threatening the inflation of customer counts to a toxic workplace culture to pending lawsuits have put 11x under fire.
The company’s AI bot—its flagship product—makes sales processes more efficient. It finds potential leads, creates tailored outreach for each, and even books meetings for you, but it’s been the target of many criticisms. Consumers have cited many complaints from the AI failing to produce any good leads or crashing completely. The real show manipulation is the use of logos from Airtable and ZoomInfo.com on the company’s website. This passed legal muster, but created legal challenges because they are not true clients.
Allegations of Customer Misrepresentation
11x recently came under fire for allegedly misrepresenting its customer base by showing logos of companies that weren’t even customers. ZoomInfo, one of those companies affected by the practice, has publicly decried 11x’s practices.
“Since November, 11x has been claiming us as a customer in a multitude of channels: in sales calls, on its website, and now even on its AI dialer,” said a ZoomInfo spokesperson.
As a result of this unauthorized use of ZoomInfo’s logo, ZoomInfo has issued threats of litigation. The spokesperson further stated:
“We’ve spent the past four months demanding that they stop displaying our logo and falsely counting us as a customer.”
Legal experts have indicated that 11x could be liable for at least a dozen fraud-related charges—including deceptive trade practices and trademark infringement.
“Several legal causes of action including but not limited to deceptive trade practices, trademark infringement, misappropriation of goodwill, and false advertising,” explained ZoomInfo’s lawyer.
Workplace Culture and Employee Turnover
This move from London to San Francisco represented a large internal change for 11x, resulting in high employee churn. News reports have raised questions about the company’s alleged work culture, which reportedly required long hours and 24/7 availability, resulting in high employee turnover.
Fewer full-time employees reported an expectation to work at least 60 hours per week. The founder-CEO, Hasan Sukkar, was noted for posting frustrations about employees in the general Slack channel, which contributed to the tense atmosphere. A former employee revealed:
“They absolutely massaged the numbers internally when it came to growth and churn.”
This sentiment was echoed by another employee who highlighted internal dissatisfaction:
“We were losing 70-80% of customers that came through the door.”
Such turnover and dissatisfaction within this cohort has led many to question whether 11x’s operational model is entirely sustainable over the long haul.
Product Performance Concerns
Was this AI bot worth it? 11x’s common offering AI bot has received backlash for failing to deliver what customers expect. We’ve heard from customers about the bot hallucinating or not loading in at all. In fact, some of those trials found that the product was less effective than human Sales Development Representatives (SDRs).
A spokesperson from ZoomInfo emphasized this during their trial period with 11x:
“During the pilot, 11x’s product performed significantly worse than our SDR employees, and we did not move forward afterward.”
For instance, customers have complained that answers provided by the AI bot are inaccurate or misleading. A former user commented:
“The actual results of the amount of automated emails versus meetings booked was disappointing.”
Even with the provision for a break clause in contracts allowing for an easy out, churn tended to be high among the early cohorts. Late 2023 was the most extreme of this but RIO has said much of it has been corrected through product enhancements and improved sales approach.
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