Meet the AI start-up that helped the PM Modi-Lex Fridman chat reach a wider audience

As podcast host Lex Fridman released his 3-hour long chat with PM Narendra Modi on Sunday, people were surprised to hear the American put forward his questions in Hindi and also taken aback by the quality of the English voiceover of the PM’s Hindi replies. This was made possible by the AI-enabled multi-lingual dubbing technology of US-based start-up ElevenLabs. The company’s dubbing tool leverages their own foundational voice AI models to help maintain the original speaker’s voice and style as it generates an output in different languages. So, while Fridman posed the questions in English and PM Modi answered in Hindi, the output of the show was possible in both Hindi and English while preserving the natural tone of both speakers...Speaking to businessline, Siddharth Srinivasan, Go-to-market lead for India, ElevenLabs, termed their work in the PM Modi interview as a “big moment” in their two-year journey...ElevenLabs in an email statement to businessline, said that “the ElevenLabs Productions team matched Prime Minister Modi’s voice in English and Lex Fridman’s voice in Hindi working closely with both parties to preserve the natural tone and accuracy of the conversation.”

This is not the first time that the start-up’s tool has helped release a high-profile interview. It also partnered with Fridman as he sat down with two other world leaders — Ukraine’s Volodymyr Zelenskyy and Argentina’s Javier Milei.