AI21 Labs, founded in 2017 by Mobileye founder Prof. Amnon Shashua with Prof. Yoav Shoham and Ori Goshen, completed a Series C funding round of $155 million at a valuation of $1.4 billion.
AI21 Labs makes sophisticated language models for developers who want to create AI-powered products at scale.
In a year when startup funding across the world has markedly decreased, this is the second-largest fundraise by an Israeli company so far. In March, eToro raised $250 million.
The new funding round brings AI21 Labs’ raised capital to a total of $283 million at a valuation of $1.4 billion, putting the company in the unicorn club of the generative AI sector.
Investors included Walden Catalyst, Pitango, SCB10X, b2venture, Samsung Next and Shashua, with participation from Google and NVIDIA as well.
“The current round will fuel the growth of the company to reach our goal of developing the next level of AI with reasoning capabilities across multiple domains,” said Shashua. “We believe that the impact of AI21 Labs’ growth plans will be felt on a global scale quite soon.”
“We are grateful for this vote of confidence by current and new investors,” added co-CEOs Shoham and Goshen. “AI21 Labs’ cutting-edge technology, including leading large language models and neurosymbolic technology, provides the robustness, predictability and explainability required in the era of AI-first enterprises. We look forward to continuing this journey with our investors, partners and customers.”
Jensen Huang, founder and CEO of NVIDIA, said, “The innovative work by the AI21 Labs team will help enterprises accelerate productivity and efficiency with generative AI-based systems that are accurate, trustworthy, and reliable.”
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