SoftBank is negotiating a $500 million funding in Skild AI, a software program firm constructing a foundational mannequin for robotics at a $4 billion valuation, Bloomberg and Financial Times reported.
The two-year-old firm raised its earlier funding spherical of $300 million at a $1.5 billion valuation final July from traders together with Jeff Bezos, Lightspeed Venture Partners, and Coatue Management.
The firm’s AI mannequin might be utilized to numerous kinds of robots, Skild founders Deepak Pathak and Abhinav Gupta informed TechCrunch final July. They stated the generalized mannequin might be modified for a particular area and use case.
The intersection of robotics and AI has witnessed substantial investor curiosity.
Over the current yr, traders, significantly Bezos, have elevated their funding to AI-powered robotics firms.
Physical Intelligence, a startup that raised $400 million at a $2 billion pre-money valuation in November, is one other startup claiming to be creating “brains” for a broad vary of robots. Jeff Bezos, Lux Capital, and Thrive Capital led that spherical.
Last February, Figure AI, a startup constructing an AI-powered humanoid robotic, raised $675 million at a $2.6 billion valuation from Microsoft, OpenAI Startup Fund, Nvidia, Amazon Industrial Innovation Fund, and Jeff Bezos (via Bezos Expeditions).
