Appen

Data vendor, HQ Australia, founded 1996. Markets physical AI data: lidar and camera-lidar-radar fusion labeling, stereo egocentric capture with wrist pose and gripper state, and evaluation of teleoperated robot performance for a frontier lab. Lost its Google contract in March 2024, which drove the FY24 revenue fall.

Data it collects

Workers in

BrazilCanadaColombiaIndiaKenyaMexicoPhilippinesUnited StatesVenezuela

Known buyers

Scale

• ~60,000 hours of video per month from up to 5,000 contributors; China is its biggest robotics data market (2026-09-20)
• Around 60,000 hours of video per month from as many as 5,000 contributors (2026-09-20)
• Global crowd of more than 1 million contractors in over 200 countries (self-reported) (2025-02-26)
• FY24 group operating revenue $234.3 million, down 14.2% (2025-02-26)

Pay

• Aims to pay above the local minimum wage (company claim)
• $0.34/h Platform micro-task workers (DiPLab survey, 600+ respondents) thecairoreview.com ↗ Secondary

Events

• 2026-09-20 Appen collects 60,000 hours of egocentric video a month abc.net.au ↗ Major outlet
• 2026-09-20 ABC profiles Indonesian egocentric gig worker and Appen's robot-data scale abc.net.au ↗ Major outlet
• 2026-02-23 Appen gig workers in Kenya unknowingly near US military work restofworld.org ↗ Major outlet
• 2024-01-20 Google terminates Appen contract searchenginejournal.com ↗ Secondary
• 2022-04-20 MIT Tech Review: How the AI industry profits from catastrophe technologyreview.com ↗ Major outlet

Sources

• Founded in 1996, Appen has customers and offices globally.asx.com.au ↗ Major outlet 2025-02-26
• Group operating revenue of $234.3 million decreased 14.2%, primarily due to termination of the Google contractasx.com.au ↗ Major outlet 2025-02-26
• Our expertise includes a global crowd of more than 1 million skilled contractors who speak over 500 languages, in over 200 countriesasx.com.au ↗ Major outlet 2025-02-26
• Appen Limited. Level 6/9 Help St Chatswood, NSW 2067 Australia.asx.com.au ↗ Major outlet 2025-02-26
• 3D bounding-box and semantic labeling on point clouds for autonomous and geospatial AI.appen.com ↗ Company claim 2026-10-05
• Stereo first-person capture with synchronized wrist pose and gripper state.appen.com ↗ Company claim 2026-10-05
• from Appen's global contributor network of 1M+ people across 170+ countriesappen.com ↗ Company claim 2026-10-05
• Appen has delivered 50,000+ units of dataappen.com ↗ Company claim 2026-10-05
• the company could collect around 60,000 hours of video per month from as many as 5,000 contributors all over the world, including India, Canada, the US, Brazil, Mexico and the Philippinesabc.net.au ↗ Major outlet 2026-09-20
• the company could collect around 60,000 hours of video per month from as many as 5,000 contributors all over the worldabc.net.au ↗ Major outlet 2026-09-20

Every row links to its source, and hovering a link shows the quote it rests on. Research compiled 2026-10-05. Method