AI with less data: lab Flapping Airplanes raises one billion dollars
The AI lab, only a year old, is valued at six billion dollars according to Bloomberg – roughly four times as much as nine months ago. It aims to train large models with far less data.
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AI research lab Flapping Airplanes has raised one billion dollars in a Series A round. The round was co-led by Index and Lux, with participation from Sequoia, GV and Kleiner Perkins, among others. According to Bloomberg, the valuation is six billion dollars. Nine months ago the lab received 180 million dollars in a seed round at a valuation of 1.5 billion dollars, so its value has roughly quadrupled.
The lab was founded by Aidan Smith and brothers Asher and Ben Spector. Its goal is to train capable models without consuming vast amounts of internet data. Technically, the team relies on a so-called megakernel framework that overlaps memory-bound inference with compute-bound training so the graphics processors are rarely idle.
"A model that's a million times more data efficient is probably a million times easier to put into the economy," Asher Spector told TechCrunch.