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The artificial intelligence startup and Menlo Ventures are launching a $100 million fund on Wednesday to back early-stage startups, and get them using the AI company's technology. It initially started with $100 million in 2008, and doubled to $200 million two years later. Venture capitalists are now looking for ways to sweeten their offers to court AI startups, as investors swarm to the hottest deals. Funding for AI startups more than doubled in the second quarter from the first, topping $24 billion, according to data from Crunchbase. OpenAI has its own venture fund, the OpenAI Startup Fund, which its website says is "investing $175 million to help AI companies have a profound, positive impact on the world."

Persons: Anthropic, Kleiner Perkins, Matt Murphy, Murphy, Daniela Amodei, Dario, OpenAI, ChatGPT Organizations: Menlo Ventures, Menlo, Apple, CNBC, Venture, OpenAI, Fund Locations: Crunchbase

☆ Exclusive: AI coding startup Anysphere is raising a new funding round with at least a $400 million valuation from A16z
▼ + stars: | 2024-07-16 | by ( Sri Muppidi | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +1 min

A16z is investing in Anysphere at a valuation of at least $400 million, sources say. Anysphere's investors include OpenAI Startup Fund, Sequoia Capital, and BoxGroup. AdvertisementAnysphere, a startup creating an AI code editor called Cursor, is raising a new funding round with at least a valuation of $400 million from A16z, Business Insider has learned. Founded in 2022, Anysphere last raised $8 million in seed funding at a valuation of $56.5 million, according to PitchBook data. This story is available exclusively to Business Insider subscribers.

Persons: —, Anysphere, Nat Friedman, Arash Ferdowsi Organizations: OpenAI, Sequoia Capital, Service, OpenAI Startup, Business Locations: Anysphere, A16z

☆ AI companies need to get society's input as they build out the technology, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman and Airbnb CEO Brian Chesky say
▼ + stars: | 2024-06-27 | by ( Lloyd Lee | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +4 min

Read previewAs companies and startups race to implement artificial intelligence into their products, Airbnb CEO Brian Chesky and OpenAI co-founder Sam Altman have a word of caution: Don't leave society behind. "I think that if everyone here could feel like they could participate and they could have their input into it, then I don't think there's a huge thing to fear," Chesky said. A few former board members accused Altman of lying to colleagues and creating a toxic culture through "psychological abuse." While researchers fear that AI will exacerbate the loneliness epidemic, Chesky believes the tool will "help bring people together." "At the end of the day, it's not the technology; it's the people with the technology," Chesky said, referring to those who are building with AI.

Persons: —, Brian Chesky, Sam Altman, Chesky, NBC News's Lester Holt, Altman, OpenAI's ChatGPT, ethicists, Sam didn't, Helen Toner, Jan Leike, Leike, it's Organizations: Service, NBC, Aspen Ideas, Business, OpenAI, Rhode Island School of Design

☆ Sam Altman is considering turning OpenAI into a regular company: report
▼ + stars: | 2024-05-30 | by ( Kwan Wei Kevin Tan | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +3 min

The 39-year-old Stanford dropout has talked about turning OpenAI into a regular, for-profit company, The Information reported on Wednesday, citing an individual who'd spoken to Altman. Unlike most companies, OpenAI says it is run as a "capped-profit" company, with its for-profit arm governed by a nonprofit. According to Toner, OpenAI's board was kept in the dark about ChatGPT's release in November 2022. Toner, who left the board shortly after Altman was reinstated as CEO, also accused him of lying about his financial interests in OpenAI. "Our focus remains on moving forward and pursuing OpenAI's mission to ensure AGI benefits all of humanity."

Persons: —, Sam Altman, Altman, OpenAI, Sam, Helen Toner, Toner, OpenAI's, Sam didn't, " Toner, Bret Taylor, OpenAI didn't Organizations: Service, Stanford, Business, Microsoft, Fund, SEC, BI Locations: OpenAI

☆ Former OpenAI board member explains why CEO Sam Altman was fired
▼ + stars: | 2024-05-29 | by ( Hayden Field | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +5 min

Former OpenAI board member Helen Toner, who helped oust CEO Sam Altman in November, broke her silence this week when she spoke on a podcast about events inside the company leading up to Altman's firing. Toner also said Altman did not tell the board he owned the OpenAI startup fund. Within a week, Altman was back and board members Toner and Tasha McCauley, who had voted to oust Altman, were out. In March, OpenAI announced its new board, which includes Altman, and the conclusion of an internal investigation by law firm WilmerHale into the events leading up to Altman's ouster. "The review concluded there was a significant breakdown of trust between the prior board and Sam and Greg," OpenAI board chair Bret Taylor said at the time, referring to president and co-founder Greg Brockman.

Persons: Helen Toner, CSET, Vox, Sam Altman, OpenAI, Toner, Altman, Sam, Ilya Sutskever, Jan Leike, Anthropic, OpenAI's, Sutskever, Tasha McCauley, Adam D'Angelo, WilmerHale, Greg, Bret Taylor, Greg Brockman, Taylor Organizations: The Ritz, Carlton, Twitter, OpenAI, Microsoft, Street Locations: Laguna Niguel, Dana Point , California

☆ Ex-OpenAI board member reveals what led to Sam Altman's brief ousting
▼ + stars: | 2024-05-28 | by ( Jyoti Mann | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +4 min

Former OpenAI board member Helen Toner revealed explosive new details about what led to CEO Sam Altman's brief ousting in November. Toner — one of the board members who voted to kick Altman out — alleged Altman also lied to the board by keeping them in the dark about the company's ownership structure. "Sam didn't inform the board that he owned the OpenAI startup fund, even though he constantly was claiming to be an independent board member with no financial interest in the company," she said. She claims he "started lying to other board members in order to try and push me off the board." Toner resigned from her role as an OpenAI board member less than two weeks after Altman returned as CEO.

Persons: Helen Toner, Sam Altman's, Bilawal Sidhu, Ted AI, Toner, Altman, OpenAI's, Toner —, —, Sam didn't, OpenAI didn't, Georgetown —, OpenAI, Sam, didn't, poach Organizations: Service, Twitter, Business, Centre for Security, Emerging Technology, Georgetown, Microsoft Locations: OpenAI, jyotimann

☆ Last year, an unknown person briefly took nominal control over OpenAI's $175 million startup fund. The company says the government filing was 'fabricated.'
▼ + stars: | 2024-03-29 | by ( Darius Rafieyan | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +4 min

One document, filed in April of 2023, listed Jacob Thomas Vespers and Vespers Inc—a company formed the same day—as manager of the fund. A document filed a few weeks later registered the address of the company as unit 234, a small second-story apartment overlooking the courtyard at The Orchard. When OpenAI was informed about the Vespers document by the journalist in July 2023, the company did not report the allegedly fabricated filing to any authorities, Wood said. All of them are associated with Jacob Thomas Vespers, referred to in some documents as Jacob Thomas Redmond Messer or Jacob Thomas Redmond or Jacob Thomas Messer. There's a github post made under a profile name, Jacob Thomas Redmond, on May 19th, 2023 that bears some tell-tale signs of being AI generated.

Persons: —, Jacob Thomas Vespers, Sam Altman, Madhav Dutt, Dutt, Kayla Wood, OpenAI, Wood, Paul Carroll, he's, Carroll, Jacob Thomas, Jacob Thomas Redmond Messer, Jacob Thomas Redmond, Jacob Thomas Messer, Redmond, Messer Organizations: Service, California, State, Business, SEC, Corporations, Integrity Locations: Santa Ana , California, The, Silicon, California

☆ The breathtaking scope of Sam Altman's future AI empire
▼ + stars: | 2024-03-07 | by ( Darius Rafieyan | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +9 min

If Sam Altman is to achieve his dream of artificial general intelligence in his lifetime, that number will need to double or triple every year for the foreseeable future. These wide-ranging plans for global transformation go far beyond Altman's role as the CEO of generative AI behemoth OpenAI, developer of ChatGPT. EnergyThe first pillar of Altman's grand unified theory of the future rests on energy. Headlining the event was company chairman and investor Sam Altman, who appeared via video call projected on a towered cineplex. And Altman's AGI empire extends beyond just the energy and raw material required to build AGI.

Persons: Sam Altman, he's, Altman, it's, Max, Jack, Sam himself, Sam, David Kirtley, Helion, He's, Joe Betts Lacroix, Lacroix, where's, Joe Biden, Tade Oyerinde, Oyerinde, Ali Ghodsi, Ghodsi Organizations: Nvidia, Business, Elon, Altman, OpenAI, Energy, Bloomberg, Concorde, Wall Street, Retro Biosciences, Capitol, PAC Locations: Silicon Valley, OpenAI, Davos, New York, Redmond , Washington, Washington

☆ Sam Altman tells staff OpenAI investigation will 'soon' close, as employees brace for more surprises
▼ + stars: | 2024-03-05 | by ( Kali Hays | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +6 min

Inside OpenAI, Sam Altman is still approachable and friendly to staff, even though many of them are realizing how little they know about how the company operates. Altman responded simply that it would be "over soon," supplying staff with no other detail, according to two people who witnessed the exchange. The internal investigation nearing its end was also reported by the Wall Street Journal and The New York Times. Such a lack of candor with employees is a more recent development for Altman, one of the people familiar noted. Although OpenAI employees are paid well, many workers are increasingly concerned about how much risk they're assuming.

Persons: Sam Altman, Altman, Slack, OpenAI, Andrej Karpathy, Karpathy, Ilya Sutskever, OpenAI's, Sutskever, Greg Brockman, Jakub Pachoki, Kali Hays Organizations: Service, Wall Street, The New York Times, SEC, Fund, Street, Microsoft, OpenAI Locations: OpenAI, Karpathy, khays@insider.com

☆ OpenAI's Startup fund just raised a $10 million SPV from two unnamed investors
▼ + stars: | 2024-02-06 | by ( Darius Rafieyan | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +1 min

The OpenAI Startup Fund is a separate but related entity from OpenAI. The fund raised $175 million last year to invest in AI companies. It has since co-led investments in legal tech startup Harvey and Ambience Healthcare, among others. AdvertisementOpenAI's venture capital fund recently raised $10 million from two unnamed investors via a special purpose vehicle or SPV, according to an SEC filing. Since then, the fund has co-led a $80 million investment in legal tech startup Harvey and was part of a $70 million investment in Ambience Healthcare, among other deals.

Persons: — Organizations: Service, SEC, Fund, Business

☆ AI startup Speak raises $16 million in latest funding led by Lachy Groom
▼ + stars: | 2023-08-31 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +1 min

AI (Artificial Intelligence) letters are placed on computer motherboard in this illustration taken, June 23, 2023. REUTERS/Dado Ruvic/Illustration/File Photo Acquire Licensing RightsAug 31 (Reuters) - Speak, an artificial intelligence (AI)-backed English language learning platform, said on Thursday that it has raised $16 million in fresh funding led by venture capitalist Lachy Groom. Lachy Groom's Fund had participated in Speak's previous funding round in which it raised $20 million. OpenAI Startup Fund is investing $100 million in AI firms and is looking for early-stage startups in sectors including healthcare, climate change and education, according to its website. Reporting by Anirudh Saligrama in Bengaluru; Editing by Nivedita BhattacharjeeOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

Persons: Dado Ruvic, Groom, Drew Houston, Arash Ferdowsi, Lachy, Anirudh, Nivedita Organizations: REUTERS, Fund, Reuters, Google, Microsoft, Thomson Locations: San Francisco, Japan, Taiwan, Germany, France, Brazil, Mexico, Bengaluru

April 26 (Reuters) - With more and more lawyers at major law firms using fast-advancing generative artificial intelligence tools, legal AI startup Harvey said Wednesday that it raised $21 million in fresh investor cash. Sequoia Capital, which is leading the Series A fundraising round, said more than 15,000 law firms are on a waiting list to start using Harvey. The company says it builds custom large language models for law firms. Technology companies and investors have rushed to embrace large language model-based generative AI since Microsoft-backed OpenAI's ChatGPT debuted in November. Casetext in March released its AI legal assistant product, CoCounsel, which uses GPT-4 to speed up tasks like legal research, contract analysis and document review.

(Reuters) - PricewaterhouseCoopers said Wednesday that it will give 4,000 of its legal professionals access to an artificial intelligence platform, becoming the latest firm to introduce generative AI technology for legal work. Other companies, law firms and professional services firms have also started to experiment with generative AI technology. Global law firm Allen & Overy last month became the first major legal business to publicly partner with Harvey. Other legal technology companies are rushing to incorporate generative AI capabilities into products. Casetext, a legal research company, said Tuesday its recently-released AI legal assistant product is also built on OpenAI's latest model, GPT-4.

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