Observed Signal · Sep 4, 2024 · Funding · Source: Trending Topics · Impact: 4/5 · Sentiment: Positive
Ilya Sutskever's Safe Superintelligence Raises $1 Billion
Safe Superintelligence (SSI), the new AI startup founded by Ilya Sutskever after his departure from OpenAI, has announced a $1 billion investment round. The company focuses on developing safe artificial general intelligence, pairing safety research with capability advancements. Investors in the round include Sequoia, Andreessen Horowitz, DST Global, SV Angel and NFDG, the investment vehicle of Nat Friedman and Daniel Gross. Reports value SSI at approximately $5 billion despite the startup not yet having a product or revenue. SSI was co-founded by Sutskever, Daniel Gross and Daniel Levy, a former Google and OpenAI researcher. The startup plans to use the capital to secure AI chips and computing capacity for training its own models. The funding adds to an ongoing trend of high-profile startups emerging from OpenAI, following Anthropic and Covariant.
A $1 billion funding round for a high-profile AI safety startup founded by an OpenAI co-founder is a major capital event in AI, with implications for the AI infrastructure and tools that increasingly underpin AdTech.
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Key Takeaways & Evidence Grounding
- Safe Superintelligence (SSI) raised $1 billion in funding, with investors including Sequoia, Andreessen Horowitz, DST Global, SV Angel and NFDG.
- SSI was co-founded by Ilya Sutskever, Daniel Gross and Daniel Levy.
- The startup is reportedly valued at around $5 billion despite having no product yet.
- Sutskever left OpenAI in 2024 due to disagreements over AI safety measures.
- SSI plans to use the capital to buy or rent AI chips to train its own models.
Connected Companies & Entities
16 Entities mapped“The article reports on Ilya Sutskever's new startup after he left OpenAI, where he was co-founder and chief scientist....”
“Sutskever's new startup announced it raised $1 billion; it focuses on AI safety and capabilities....”
“Mentioned as a startup that split off from OpenAI and now works closely with Google and Amazon....”
“Listed as one of the investors in SSI's $1 billion round....”
“Mentioned as part of NFDG's AI startup portfolio....”
“Mentioned as part of NFDG's AI startup portfolio....”
“Mentioned as part of NFDG's AI startup portfolio....”
“Listed as one of the investors in SSI's $1 billion round....”
“Mentioned as part of NFDG's AI startup portfolio....”
“Listed as one of the investors in SSI's $1 billion round....”
“Listed as one of the investors in SSI's $1 billion round....”
“Nat Friedman is former CEO of GitHub....”
“Cue, co-founded by Daniel Gross, was sold to Apple in 2013....”
“Daniel Levy previously worked at Google; Anthropic works closely with Google....”
“Anthropic works closely with Amazon; Covariant founders moved to Amazon for robotics AI....”
Ontology Mapping & Concepts
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