# Startups racing to build AI voice agents

See which tools startups and enterprises are using to build AI voice agents in our June 2025 Brex Benchmark.

**URL Source:** https://www.brex.com/journal/brex-benchmark-june-2025

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The Brex Benchmark

Startups racing to build AI voice agents

_The Brex Benchmark is a monthly snapshot of the top software and AI vendors by dollar spend using Brex. With 30,000+ customers spending billions of dollars, you get an inside look at the top tools driving modern business. We updated our methodology this month to include Brex card and bill pay transactions to capture a more comprehensive spending picture. "Startups" are companies with under 250 employees, and "enterprises" are those with 250+ employees._

![Overall data for June](https://brand.brex.com/transform/97320b99-21ae-481a-9532-5b9bf9757bff/june-brex-benchmark-bento)

Voice AI is having a moment as it becomes the go-to tech for modern customer service.

Our June spend data shows startups layering AI-powered voice solutions on top of communication platforms like **Twilio** and **Bandwidth**. The infrastructure handles voice, messaging, and connectivity while speech-to-text tools like **Deepgram **and **AssemblyAI** and text-to-speech tool **ElevenLabs** add intelligence for natural conversations. 

They’re building AI that processes spoken language and responds with speech fast, enabling startups to create real-time voice agents for natural, two-way conversations with customers. Think voice-enabled AI assistants, automated appointment booking, and scalable 24/7 support that actually feels human.

Brex customers like [**Speechify**](https://speechify.com/) and [**Vapi**](https://vapi.ai/) are scaling AI voice products fast, and even VCs are bullish on the space. The Information reported rising investor excitement around [voice agent startups](https://www.theinformation.com/articles/vcs-keeping-ear-voice-ai-startups), and **OpenAI** and **Anthropic** also recently released new audio models for developers. Deepgram, ElevenLabs, and AssemblyAI were also top-10 tools in our [May 2025 Brex Benchmark](https://www.brex.com/journal/brex-benchmark-may-2025).

Top AI vendors — June 2025

![Top 10 AI tools in June 2025, by dollars spent on Brex](https://brand.brex.com/transform/65463336-38c6-4056-b482-2f286454f6b6/Brex-Benchmark-June)

**Anthropic** spending retained the top spot among startup spending, as did **OpenAI** for enterprises. However, both segments significantly increased spend on their respective No. 2 gen AI vendors — **OpenAI** for startups, **Anthropic** for enterprises. Startups spent 20% more with **OpenAI, **potentially even leveraging its newest audio models for voice agents. Meanwhile, enterprises spent 137% more MoM with **Anthropic**, moving it ahead of **Cursor** for the No. 2 spot.

Other takeaways:

- Startups are prioritizing tools that make information more accessible and actionable. They’re spending on tools like **Glean** to search across sources like Slack and Google Workplace, **ReadAI** to distill meetings and messages into summaries, and **Pinecone** to organize and search large volumes of unstructured data.
- Visual AI tools are gaining traction in enterprises. **Midjourney** spending more than tripled MoM among large businesses, while **Runway** remains popular for video generation even as it dropped from the startup top 10.
- **Cursor** is another AI tool we’re continuing to watch, with 29% more MoM spend among startups and a sticky product deeply embedded in dev workflows.

Top SaaS vendors — June 2025

![Top 10 SaaS tools in June 2025, by dollars spent on Brex](https://brand.brex.com/transform/2d346df9-8b32-477c-9f05-55ae9762c8ea/Brex-Benchmark-June)

_**Note: **MoM changes are relative to the combined Brex cards and bill pay spend data._

**Google **ousted **Atlassian** for the No. 1 spot in enterprise spending. Despite newer solutions popping up, **Atlassian** tools like Jira, Confluence, and Trello are still deeply embedded in product, engineering, and IT workflows. **Postman's** rise into the enterprise top 10 reflects growing demand for robust APIs to connect AI and other tools.

Other notable trends:

- Startup spending on **Amazon** rose 27% month-over-month, while **Meta** and **Google** saw declines of 28% and 14%, respectively. Since these are among the top ad and cloud platforms for Brex customers, it’s normal to see month-to-month spend swings.
- Enterprises may be exploring similar voice AI approaches as startups, with customer service platform **Zendesk** and **Deepgram **cracking their respective top-10 lists.
- Popular hiring platform** Indeed **showed a significant MoM spending decrease (54%) in the enterprise.

_Sumeet Marwaha is the Senior Manager of Data Science at Brex, supporting the Go-To-Market team in understanding how Brex customers spend, adopt tools, and grow their businesses._

_All analysis conducted for this report that uses Brex internal customer data is anonymized and aggregated for privacy. To learn more about how we use data in anonymized or aggregated form for these trend reports, email us at privacy@brex.com._

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