Changin “Roy” Lee, 21, has announced that he has raised $5.3 million in seed funding for his startup Cluely. The project offers an AI tool to “cheat on exams, interviews, and work tasks.” Cluely is based on the Interview Coder service that Lee and co-founder Neil Shanmugam created while studying at Columbia University. Because of the tool’s development, the two students faced disciplinary action and eventually left the university, as the university newspaper reported last week.
Interview Coder initially helped candidates automate answers to technical questions during interviews, such as on the LeetCode platform, which Cluely’s founders call “outdated.” Now the service has expanded its functionality: it works in a hidden browser window, invisible to interviewers or examiners, and suggests solutions in real time. According to Lee, he himself used the tool to get an internship at Amazon. The company declined to comment on his case, but confirmed that candidates are required to agree not to use third-party programs during interviews.
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Photo: Cluely
Cluely has published a manifesto comparing itself to a calculator and spell checker, technologies that were also initially considered “cheating”. To support the launch, the startup released a provocative video: in it, Lee, with the help of an AI assistant, tries to convince a girl on a date at a restaurant that he knows art and is older than his age. The video, posted on X, has racked up more than 2 million views, but has sparked controversy. Users, including developer Cody Blakeney, compared it to an episode of the TV series Black Mirror, noting the dark irony of the script.
Despite the criticism, Cluely has seen rapid growth, with monthly revenue exceeding $3 million and the number of subscribers on the platform doubling in the last quarter. “People want to focus on creativity, not mechanical tasks. Our tool is the next step in the evolution of productivity,” Lee said. Meanwhile, the startup itself has found itself at the center of a debate about the ethics of AI.
Columbia University declined to comment on the situation with the founders, citing privacy laws. However, there are already calls in academic circles to revise the rules for exams and interviews. Cluely, for its part, plans to invest in multi-lingual support and integration with VR platforms, which could further complicate the detection of AI use.
As Cluely notes, “calculators didn’t destroy math – they changed the way we approach it.” The next few months will show whether the project will be a similar breakthrough or turn into a dystopian warning.
