The American Express Company Building at 65 Broadway between Morris Street and Rector Street in the Financial District of Manhattan, New York City. Photo: Beyond My Ken via Wikicommons.

CTech – American Express Ventures has backed natural language startup Voca.ai, bringing the company’s current funding round to $3.5 million, the company announced Wednesday. The company announced it had raised $2.6 million from Lool Ventures and Flint Capital in December.

Founded in 2017 and based in the Tel Aviv suburb of Bnei Brak, Voca.ai develops voice assistants for call centers using natural language and artificial intelligence technologies. According to the company, its voice assistants are capable of analyzing speech to determine the speaker’s intention in real-time, imitating human speech patterns such as changing pitch, pace, and intonation to deliver a more conversational interaction.