*By Madison Alworth*
Siri can play your jam on demand and Alexa gives you the weather, but the app makers behind Hugging Face really want to be there for you when you need a laugh, some encouragement, or friendly advice.
That's the promise of the artificial intelligence chatbot, designed to exchange messages, emojis, and life lessons with a generation of users desperate for a response whenever they text ー teenagers.
"Ultimately, we think that everyone will chat with an A.I. everyday, all day," said Clément Delangue, a co-founder and the CEO of Hugging Face. "But as for most new technology and mainstream technologies, they were the first to adopt it."
Though teenagers may be the first cohort willing to accept A.I. B.F.F.s, Delangue said anyone can befriend Hugging Face, which will attempt to respond to text queries with personalized responses as the app begins to "care" about you, but not exactly the way a human might.
"A dog, a cat is a different form of intelligence. It's not a human form of intelligence," Delangue said in an interview Tuesday with Cheddar. "But you really enjoy playing with your cat or with your dog every day, and you create some form of emotional attachment."
Hugging Face is designed to mimic this sort of unconditional relationship using A.I.
"We think the same thing is going to happen for artificial intelligence, meaning everyone will have their A.I. B.F.F. that they're going to chat with every day," Delangue said.
Hugging Face has already made some well-heeled friends. It raised $1.2 million in pre-seed funding last year and recently raised $4 million in a seed round led by Ronny Conway of a_capital, an early investor in Instagram. Delangue said that the investments will help the company to develop its technology without worrying about having to make money for the next few years.
Hugging Face is available as a stand-alone app and as an add-on for Facebook Messenger.
For the full interview, [click here](https://cheddar.com/videos/new-chatbot-wants-to-be-your-bff).
U.S. markets opened sharply lower on Friday on hotter-than-expected inflation data. The May CPI showed an 8.6% jump in consumer prices year-over-year, higher the expected 8.3%. Mark Howard, Senior Multi-Asset Specialist at BNP Paribas joined Cheddar's Opening Bell to discuss.
U.S. stocks closed Friday at session lows after May CPI data showed inflation in the U.S. has not peaked and is still rising rapidly. For the week, the S&P fell 5.06%, the Dow lost 4.58%, and the Nasdaq dropped 5.60%, marking the worst week since January for all three major indexes. Mike Zigmont, Head of Trading and Research at Harvest Volatility Management, joins Cheddar News' Closing Bell to discuss.
Benefits brokerage, Nava Benefits, raised $40 million in a Series B round. Nava says it's on a mission to fix healthcare, one benefits plan at a time. The startup is working to bring benefits to small business that are normally available to only Fortune 500 companies. Brandon Weber, Co-Founder and CEO of Nava Benefits, joined Cheddar News' Closing Bell to discuss.
The electric vehicle maker filed a proposal for a three-for-one stock split, increasing the accessibility of shares for investors for a stock trading at around $700 a share. The move comes not long after tech giant Amazon announced a 20-for-one split. The number of authorized shares rises from two billion to six billion. It was also revealed that board member Larry Ellison does not intend to stand for reelection as it pertains to Tesla.
President Biden proposed a new rule that would add 500,000 chargers for electric vehicles nationwide. The proposal comes amid the rapid shift to EVs with dozens of automakers announcing plans for all-electric fleets within the next decade. But with the new surge will the U.S. have the proper infrastructure to keep up? Scott Painter, founder and CEO of Autonomy.com joined Cheddar's Opening Bell to discuss. "I really think the idea of standardization is a big deal. Standardization certainly makes it much better for everybody to be able to get a charge when they need one," he said.
