Stan Suchkov, CEO and Co-founder of Evolve – Interview Series

Stan Suchkov, CEO and Co-founder of Evolve, is a seasoned entrepreneur and executive who currently leads EvolveApp and also serves as the founder and lecturer at AI Corporate University, where he focuses on equipping middle and senior managers with practical AI knowledge and a clear understanding of how to apply it within their organizations. He previously built and scaled a company to over $10 million in annual revenue before exiting successfully, and his career has been shaped by a strong bias toward action, experimentation, and continuous learning. Beyond his entrepreneurial work, Stan is deeply committed to people development, actively coaching and mentoring emerging leaders around the world. He brings a global mindset to his work and is driven by a mission to inspire and cultivate forward-thinking leaders who are prepared to lead in an increasingly digital and AI-driven era.

Evolve is an AI-native corporate learning platform built to turn internal company knowledge into measurable, real-world performance. The platform enables organizations to rapidly convert existing documents, files, and materials into structured courses, intelligent knowledge hubs, and AI-powered assessments in as little as one day. Designed to go beyond traditional learning management systems, Evolve emphasizes adaptive learning, practical skill-building, and deep analytics that reveal comprehension, readiness, and performance rather than just completion rates. It is built to scale across onboarding, operations, sales, and continuous training, helping companies deliver knowledge that actually sticks and drives results across the organization.

You’ve described yourself as someone who thrives on building and launching new products. What inspired you personally to start Evolve, and how does it connect with your entrepreneurial journey so far?

First of all, a startup is about endurance. It is about running every day, every month, for many years. This pace and way of life truly resonate with me. I often say that once you launch a product, receive your first investment, and hire a team, you should be ready to run — and not just for a year.

This mindset is one of the reasons I started Evolve. The second reason is my long-standing ambition to build an international startup and create something truly big and meaningful. That is why I chose to leave a strong position in an established company and fully commit to the entrepreneurial journey.

Last but not least, I strongly believe that people come first. The HR and learning space is one of the few areas where you can build products that genuinely impact people’s lives. Through Evolve, I wanted to create something that not only supports business growth, but also helps individuals develop, adapt, and grow.

Before founding Evolve, you successfully scaled a company to $10M in annual revenue and exited. How did that experience shape the way you approached building this AI-native learning platform?

I built the company from scratch, and it grew very fast. At that stage, I learned how challenging rapid growth can be without enough structure. This experience significantly shaped how I approach building companies today. Early in my entrepreneurial journey, I moved quickly and made bold decisions, which helped drive growth. At the same time, it showed me the importance of thinking ahead, understanding burn rate, and evaluating the long-term impact of decisions.

When building Evolve, I consciously applied these lessons. I combined the speed and ambition of my early experience with a stronger focus on sustainability, clear metrics, and scalable execution. As a result, Evolve was built as an AI-native platform designed to grow efficiently while meeting enterprise-level requirements.

At the very beginning, you sought advice from 10 different founders, including competitors. What were the most surprising insights you took away from those conversations, and how did they shape the product?

What surprised me most was that they actually responded. I reached out to founders I honestly didn’t expect to hear back from, some of whom were competitors,  and simply asked for their advice and perspective. I was very open about where we were and the challenges we were facing.

And, like in the Pay It Forward movie, I realized how strong this culture of mutual support really is among founders. It doesn’t matter whether you’re a small fish in the startup ocean or a big whale — people are willing to help. What really stayed with me is that every whale was once a small fish, and at some point, someone helped them grow into a big player.

Evolve has just raised $1M in seed funding led by AltaIR Capital, with backing from 500 Global and others. How will this investment accelerate adoption and expand the platform’s capabilities?

The startup journey is long and often challenging. This investment will help us grow into a strong player in the onboarding space, with a clear set of values that truly set us apart from competitors.

Our goal is to build a learning flow that truly differentiates us — from AI-powered training creation and autonomous assignment of trainings and meetings, to knowledge retention with simulations, a knowledge base, and analytics that support better decision-making.

Many corporate employees report finding training boring or unengaging. What role does AI play in transforming that experience into something interactive, personalized, and impactful?

A huge one! First of all, AI helps reduce the amount of information employees need to go through during onboarding by creating personalized learning tracks.

I also believe that traditional trainings will gradually be replaced by simulations, and this will fundamentally change how people learn. Instead of consuming theory, employees will be able to practice skills and immediately see the outcomes of their actions.

AI copilots will also transform how employees search for information, make decisions, and take action in their daily work. Overall, I believe the HR field is one of the areas that benefits the most from AI adoption inside companies.

Unlike traditional Learning Management Systems (LMS), Evolve focuses on rapid course creation and AI-driven simulations. Can you share a concrete example of how one of your enterprise clients is using this approach in practice?

Yes, definitely. Let’s take the financial services industry as an example. Their goal was to make the learning process not just engaging, but also efficient and seamless.

Using the platform, they created courses, automated the distribution of those courses, and launched compliance trainings and assessments. Our platform generated reports based on the exact templates they needed, while simulations gave employees the opportunity to practice real-life client scenarios they are likely to face in their day-to-day work.

On top of that, employees have access to a knowledge base where they can ask questions about products and services at any time.  All of these capabilities have significantly improved service quality. The solution is also deployed on the client’s own servers, ensuring a high level of security for sensitive and personal data.

You’ve built Evolve to work not only for Learning and Development (L&D) teams but also across hiring, operations, and sales. Where do you see the biggest opportunities for scaling beyond traditional training use cases?

I believe Operations and Sales teams can benefit the most from this approach, because it democratizes how training and learning experiences are launched. With the platform, teams don’t need dedicated L&D experts — they can simply upload content, create trainings, tests, and quizzes, roll them out to employees, and track progress in one place.

With clients such as Carlsberg already onboard, what have been the most valuable lessons from working with global enterprises at this stage?

It showed us that innovation has to be practical. Large enterprises are open to new ideas, but they also need solutions that integrate seamlessly into existing workflows and systems and deliver measurable impact. Finding that balance — between innovation and real-world implementation — has strongly shaped how we design, deliver, and scale our solutions.

Beyond Evolve, you’re also the founder and lecturer at AI Corporate University, where you educate executives about AI. How does that work influence or complement what you’re building at Evolve?

That work naturally complemented what I was building at Evolve. It helped generate leads, and it also worked the other way around — my hands-on experience with AI strengthened the startup and influenced how we approached the product. At this stage, I’m fully focused on Evolve, and the work at the university is on pause.

Looking ahead, where do you see the biggest impact of AI-driven learning over the next five years, both for companies and for employees themselves?

One of the biggest trends we’re seeing right now is people switching professions and areas of expertise. AI is changing the workforce landscape so fast that it’s hard to predict what many roles will look like in two or three years. That’s why AI-driven learning is so important — it helps people adapt quickly, absorb new knowledge, and apply new skills much faster.

Readers who wish to learn more about Evolve and its AI-native approach to corporate learning and onboarding should visit Evolve.