General Intuition vs Thinking Machines Lab

AI Investors Pour Billions into World Models After LLMs

The article discusses the emerging trend of AI investors shifting focus from large language models (LLMs) to 'world models'—AI systems that understand and simulate the physical world. This shift is seen as the next big opportunity, with billions of dollars flowing into startups working on these models. However, the article notes that most of these ventures lack a clear business model or revenue generation, making them speculative investments. The piece highlights specific examples like MicroAGI, a startup deploying robotic cleaners in Munich, and mentions significant funding rounds in the sector, including a $320M investment in General Intuition and a record funding for AMI Labs led by Yann LeCun. The article is behind a paywall, so detailed analysis is limited.

• Investors are pouring billions into 'world models' as the next big AI opportunity after LLMs.
• MicroAGI is a startup deploying robots for cleaning tasks in Munich, showcasing world model applications.
• General Intuition raised $320 million from celebrity investors for its world model technology.

General Intuition in $6B Funding Talks

General Intuition, a New York AI startup building a foundation model to train generalized AI agents for movement in space and time, is in talks to raise funding at a $6 billion pre-money valuation from new investors including Valor Equity Partners, Point72 Ventures, and Seven Seven Six. Existing backers Khosla Ventures and General Catalyst are also participating. The company plans to use proceeds to advance its general model toward robotic embodiments, increasing spend on compute (with a partnership with CoreWeave) and hiring. CEO Pim de Witte spun the company out from the gameplay clip-sharing platform Medal in October 2025. The round is reportedly oversubscribed and still being finalized.

• General Intuition is in talks to raise funding at a $6 billion pre-money valuation.
• New investors reportedly include Valor Equity Partners, Point72 Ventures, and Seven Seven Six.
• Existing investors Khosla Ventures and General Catalyst are participating in the round.

Gaming Data Startup General Intuition Raises $320M

TechCrunch covers General Intuition — a Bezos-backed, New York-based startup that uses video-game data to train world models for physical AI — and features CEO Pim de Witte on TechCrunch’s Equity podcast. The company recently closed a $320 million funding round at a reported $2.3 billion valuation, with participation from Coatue, Eric Schmidt and researchers affiliated with MIT and Google DeepMind. The interview discusses why gaming data may better capture space-and-time dynamics than web text, the company’s spinout from gaming platform Medal TV, and ethical concerns including potential defense uses of its models.

• General Intuition is a New York-based startup that uses video-game data to train world models for physical AI.
• The company is described as Bezos-backed and reportedly valued at $2.3 billion.
• General Intuition closed a $320 million funding round with investors including Coatue and Eric Schmidt, plus researchers at MIT and Google DeepMind.

Putting Task Expertise into RL Achieves State-of-the-Art Performance on Text-to-SQL

Thinking Machines Lab announced two new updates: a research breakthrough in RL for text-to-SQL and new safety research grants.

Barret Zoph Joins Google as VP of Research

Barret Zoph, co‑founder of AI startup Thinking Machines Lab and a former OpenAI employee, has taken a role as vice president of research at Google. Zoph previously co‑founded Thinking Machines with Mira Murati after leaving OpenAI in October 2024, briefly returned to OpenAI in January 2026 to lead AI enterprise sales, and departed in June 2026 after a five‑month stint. Tech reporting notes Zoph was fired from Thinking Machines earlier this year. Google said it expects Zoph to contribute reinforcement learning and post‑training expertise to its Gemini efforts. The move is one of several high‑profile executive shifts in the AI industry this year.

• Barret Zoph co‑founded Thinking Machines Lab and later rejoined OpenAI.
• Zoph spent five months at OpenAI in 2026 heading AI enterprise sales and left in June 2026.
• Zoph was reported to have been fired from Thinking Machines earlier in 2026.

AI Demands New Interaction Models for Designers

The article argues that recent multimodal AI models are changing the fundamental grammar of software interaction, shifting interfaces from task-driven, turn-taking flows to continuous, intent-driven exchanges. It highlights a research preview from Thinking Machines Lab that demonstrates real-time multimodal 'interaction models' which can listen, see, and respond across audio, video, and text while building interfaces (a generative UI) on the fly. The author outlines design implications — rebuilding mental models, new entry/navigation conventions, deliberate intervention points, and routing judgment to humans — particularly for enterprise contexts that require auditability and accountability.

• Thinking Machines Lab released a research preview called Interaction Models demonstrating real-time multimodal exchange (audio, video, and text) and on-the-spot interface generation.
• The article’s author, Arin Bhowmick, is Chief Design Officer at SAP.
• A paper from TCS Research, “Can LLMs Perceive Time?”, found top models estimate task duration four to seven times too high and cannot accurately report how long their own work took.