Mercor CEO Brendan Foody Calls It 'A New Category Of Work' As His $10 Billion Company Pays Humans Over $1.5 Million A Day To Train AI

Mercor is paying more than $1.5 million a day to people training artificial intelligence systems. 

Brendan Foody, the company's CEO and cofounder, said in a recent company blog post that the San Francisco-based startup was valued at $10 billion. He described human-led AI training as "a new category of work" and said demand is growing as companies use contractors to improve model accuracy and reasoning.

Humans Teaching Machines

Foody told "The TBPN Show" podcast hosts John Coogan and Jordi Hays last month that Mercor has been "growing like crazy" following the valuation announcement. 

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Mercor works with more than 30,000 contractors worldwide who train AI models in fields such as software engineering, banking and law to improve accuracy and adaptability, according to TechCrunch.

Foody wrote that millions of people will "spend the next decade teaching machines the judgment, nuance, and taste that only humans possess." He added, "Instead of doing predictable work repeatedly, they’ll teach agents how to do it once, so the agent can do it a million times."

Training AI Becomes The New Gold Rush

Human-led AI training is one of the fastest-growing sectors in tech. Contractors can earn up to $100 an hour teaching chatbots tone, context, and cultural nuance, according to Business Insider.

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Some contractors train chatbots such as xAI's Grok to understand internet culture, while others work on domain-specific data to enhance model performance.

At the same time, startups connecting trainers with AI labs have drawn significant investor interest. Companies including Scale AI and Surge AI have achieved multibillion-dollar valuations, boosting their founders' fortunes.

Forbes estimated that Surge AI CEO Edwin Chen is worth about $18 billion, while Scale AI co-founders Alexandr Wang and Lucy Guo have net worths of roughly $3.2 billion and $1.4 billion, respectively.

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IPO On The Horizon

Foody told Coogan and Hays that an initial public offering for Mercor is "potentially on the horizon," though he did not share a date. 

Mercor's momentum shows how humans remain essential to training and refining intelligent systems. As Foody wrote in the company's blog post last month, people are now teaching machines the same judgment and creativity that once defined their own work.

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