Ex-Openai-CTO gets 2 billion-for AI startup without a specific product

Mira Murati is said to have secured $ 2 billion for her new Ki startup-with a focus on AGI and a team of Openai veterans.

In September 2024, Mira Murati announced to leave Openai. In her message to the employees, it was said that she wanted to devote herself to her own research.

Before that, she was part of Open AI for over six years, and the past two and a half years led her as CTO the technical product developments for chatt and the image generator Dall-E.

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After Altman's short-term discharge in 2023, Murati had temporarily taken over the CEO position. She is also referred to as the “Minister of Truth” by Openaai because she is committed to ensuring that the company's AI products are not misleading or biased.

Billion -dollar financing just six months after the establishment

Only shortly after her resignation she founded her own Ki startup, Thinking Machines Lab. According to Financial Times (FT), it is said to have collected around 1.7 billion euros ($ 2 billion) in a seed round, for an assessment of 8.7 billion euros ($ 10 billion).

That is one of the largest seed financing rounds in the history of Silicon Valley, insiders told FT.

At the time, the startup has only been in existence for six months and there is hardly any information about the product or the future plans.

Thinking Machines Lab Website

Former Openai employees followed Murati

According to FT, the investors primarily rely on Muratis call-it was significantly involved in the development of chatt, dall-e and voice mode. Other investors are said to have rejected an investment because there was no information about the product or business model, according to FT.

Andreessen Horowitz is said to have led the round, with the participation of Conviction Partners from the former Greylock partner Sarah Guo.

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Murati was able to get top-class ex-Openai employees on board. This is how her Openai co-founder John Schulman, the former Head of Special Projects Jonathan Lachman and the two ex-VPS Barret Zoph and Lilian little to follow Thinking Machine Labs.

Something with AI

According to FT insider information, Thinking Machines Lab is working on “Artificial General Intelligence”-that is, systems that are comparable or superior to human intelligence. The company only vaguely said in February that Ki wanted to make a “understandable, more customizable and generally capable”, the article says.

The startup should have an unusual governance structure. According to the structure of the financing, Murati is said to have more voting rights than all other board members-it has the last word for all important decisions.

Thinking Machines Labs rejected a statement to FT, it is said.