SANTA CLARA, California, May 8, 2026, 02:06 PDT
SoundHound AI dropped 12% in after-hours action, as investors took in the company’s latest numbers: first-quarter revenue hit a record $44.2 million, a 52% jump from last year. Still, an ongoing loss and the mounting cost of acquisitions left the market unimpressed.
Timing is key here. SoundHound, once focused on supplying voice tech for restaurants, cars, and various devices, now aims to reinvent itself as a broader player in enterprise customer-service automation. Clients are actively weighing how much more they can trust AI agents to do, hoping for fewer human interventions. At the heart of this shift: the company’s planned acquisition of LivePerson.
The field’s crowded. Gartner points to conversational-AI offerings from Cognigy, Kore.ai, and Genesys Cloud CX—all platforms deployed by companies to run chatbots, virtual assistants, and other cross-channel AI agents. SoundHound, on the other hand, carves out a more focused proposition: one platform covering voice, messaging, and agentic AI (systems capable of multi-step actions).
SoundHound reported a GAAP net loss of $25.0 million for the first quarter. On a non-GAAP basis—which excludes certain accounting items—the loss came in a bit higher at $26.6 million. The company held firm on its 2026 revenue guidance, sticking with its previous range of $225 million to $260 million. As of the end of March, SoundHound said it had $216 million in cash on hand and remained debt-free.
Chief Executive Keyvan Mohajer put it simply: “SoundHound started the year strong with our top line growing 52%.” Strip out acquisitions, and revenue jumped 88% in the company’s core automotive and IoT AI unit, he said. SoundHound AI
SoundHound is pushing further into the market with acquisitions. On April 21, the company said it would buy LivePerson in an all-stock transaction, putting a $43 million value on the target’s equity—roughly a 22% premium over LivePerson’s 30-day volume-weighted average. The deal carries an enterprise value of around $250 million after adjusting for LivePerson’s debt discounts, according to both companies.
LivePerson brings SoundHound a digital-messaging platform that, according to both companies, already handles a billion customer messages every month. The deal, as outlined in the acquisition release, would put the combined group in over 30 countries, counting among its clients 12 of the world’s 15 biggest banks, four of the top five global airlines, and four of the five largest global automakers.
LivePerson CEO John Sabino, in the announcement, said those “artificial boundaries between ‘talking’ and ‘typing’ are disappearing.” SoundHound’s Mohajer described the move as a union of “two complementary conversational AI pioneers.” That’s a signal: they’re betting customer service will shift seamlessly between phone, chat, web, and mobile—no more siloed systems. SoundHound AI
This quarter, SoundHound put the spotlight on OASYS, its orchestrated agentic-AI platform. According to the company, OASYS is able to create, coordinate, test, and refine AI agents as time goes on. On the earnings call, Mohajer said new customers are lined up to use the platform, and the plan is to transition legacy users slowly, since many of their existing integrations have been established over several years.
Not everyone’s seeing the LivePerson acquisition as a downside. Wedbush reaffirmed its Outperform and held onto its $12 target in the wake of the news, arguing the deal could put SoundHound in front of a “transformational market shift” and help expand its customer reach. D.A. Davidson kept its Buy as well—even as it flagged some risk around integration. TheStreet
Execution is the sticking point here. SoundHound keeps posting losses, and its GAAP gross margin slid to 31.1%—down from 36.5% a year ago. The company also burned through $26.3 million in operating cash for the quarter. As for the LivePerson acquisition, that’s not expected to close until the back half of 2026, pending approvals and the usual closing steps, so any real revenue uptick won’t show up until 2027 at the earliest.
Reuters calls SoundHound a conversational-intelligence company, noting its voice and AI tech is used across industries like retail, healthcare, financial services, automotive, smart devices, and restaurants. Now, the company faces a key question: Can this broad reach actually drive faster growth, or will it just add more complexity to integration?
