A letter from Wen

To Pulp's early investors,

Where it started

In 2019, Shah and I were in my apartment in Atlanta, working through an idea. Online engagement was becoming more toxic and less engaging. Could we build technology that actually improves how people engage online?

Through COVID, we tried to answer that question with a debate platform. We saw debates everywhere and believed there was a better way to host them. We weren't the first to think so. TruStory, a debate platform backed by $3 million in venture funding, launched around the same time and shut down in early 2020. They moved fast and spent big. We moved slowly and learned carefully.

What we learned, and what TruStory's experience confirmed, is that a consumer platform was not the right path at the time. People debate all the time, but how do you score a debate? What cannot be measured cannot be improved. We needed to go deeper into the research and build a system that analyzes the forces that persuade people.

From 2023 to 2025, Shah ran a research apprenticeship program, and that cohort built the research foundation Pulp runs on today.

In 2025, after five years working as a data scientist and finishing a second master's degree in mental health, I came back to see what Shah had been building. I was struck by the quality of the work and the talent he had gathered, and I decided to take an active role in Pulp.

Where Pulp is now

Pulp is an AI research company focused on conversation modeling, interaction design and systems engineering. We build solutions for complex, large-scale natural language data, and our flagship product, Thinkwell, launches soon.

The problem. The people whose work is persuasion, in government relations, public affairs and public agencies, make high-stakes calls they cannot measure. Their tools count clicks and mentions. None of them shows whether a message landed, with whom, or why.

The product. Thinkwell is a workstation that researches the record, tests a message against simulated readers, scores it against the goal you set, and shows its reasons for every score.

The market. Federal lobbying alone was a record $5.08 billion market in 2025, across 15,768 organizations. The incumbent tools were built to count mentions, and the new AI tools generate words without measuring what they do.

Customers. This was the missing piece for years. Not anymore. A Washington lobbying firm is adopting Thinkwell, and we are finalizing terms with a second customer. Our research has been presented at the American Sociological Association and the University of Florida, with INFORMS and the American Society of Criminology next.

The team. Shah, Damani, Uday, Pat, Hannah, and me. Plus the apprentices, advisors, and mentors who carried us through the lean years.

The money

Your early investment funded the research, the first team and the infrastructure Pulp runs on today. Where we stand now, including our finances and the round we are raising, is in the investor update that comes with this letter.

The offer

We are offering every early investor the same deal: exchange your note for equity in Pulp Corporation, on the terms set out in full in the agreement that accompanies this letter. The next chapter walks through the process in plain English. We ask that you let us know by the date in your letter, and we are glad to talk through any option with you, including what happens if you choose not to exchange.

You believed in Pulp before there was much to believe in. Now there is a product customers want, a clear position in the market, and a solid team behind it. That early trust meant everything, and it still does.