Star athlete and former San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick is no stranger to the cutthroat world of media. After being blackballed by the NFL for protesting police violence against Black communities, he’s become a civil rights activist, which has informed the businesses he’s founded.
In 2020, he started Kaepernick Publishing to emphasize minority voices and, earlier this week, he debuted Lumi AI, which uses artificial intelligence to help creators take their story ideas and turn them into products that they can sell. The company is currently focused on helping creators develop comics and graphic novels, and distributing them.
Lumi, which has snagged $4 million in seed funding led by Reddit co-founder Alexis Ohanian’s venture capital firm Seven Seven Six, is a monthly subscription service of AI tools for comics creation.
Lumi will take a cut from sales, and creators will retain the rights to their work.
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We’re a little more than halfway through 2024, but the AI market has already had a wild year, attracting increased investments in Q2 and skyrocketing to $24 billion, more than doubling from the previous quarter, according to Reuters.
However, this swift expansion has sparked tension within creative communities, many fearing that widespread job loss is imminent.
Kaepernick spoke with ADWEEK about his vision for integrating creators.
This interview has been edited for clarity and brevity.
ADWEEK: What business problems do you solve?
Kaepernick: We’re focused on helping creators go from an idea to a final product, and we’re starting with comics, graphic novels and manga. So, taking that idea into a finished digital product, we also do the physical distribution for them, as well as help them merchandise all on one platform.
The other part that’s important is creators own all the IP that they create. A lot of the learnings and barriers we’re solving for is what I learned through five years of building a publishing company and 10 years of building a media company, and I want to remove that barrier by creating access and opportunity for creators.
How do you plan to use the $4 million raised, and do you plan to hire more people?
