AI pioneer Yann LeCun is launching his new startup AMI Labs with more than $1 billion. Ex-meta researcher Alex LeBrun takes over as CEO.
Yann LeCun – considered France’s best-known AI scientist – secured an exceptionally high investment of around 890 million euros for his new startup. And appoints a new CEO.
In a post on
More than $1 billion in seed capital raised
“We have secured a $1.03 billion seed round to advance our mission of developing intelligent systems capable of truly understanding the real world – a long-term scientific endeavor,” said LeBrun.
AMI Labs said in a post on X on Tuesday that the funding round was co-led by Cathay Innovation, Greycroft, Hiro Capital, HV Capital and Bezos Expeditions, among other investors.
The Paris-based startup added that it is building a team of researchers and engineers in Paris, New York, Montreal and Singapore.
“Not a conventional laboratory”
AI researcher and computer science professor at New York University Saining Xie also said in a post on X on Tuesday that he had joined the founding team. Xie, who serves as co-founder and chief science officer, wrote: “AMI is not a traditional laboratory.”
“We have no intention of becoming one,” he added. According to the company’s job postings, AMI Labs is seeking engineers, scientists and researchers for its four global locations.
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Focus on developing “world models”
LeCun announced plans to launch the startup in November after leaving Meta. Most recently, he led AI research activities there for 12 years.
AMI Labs will focus on developing so-called world models, a type of AI systems designed to better understand and reflect how the real world works. LeCun had said that the startup will be among the few groundbreaking AI labs that are “neither Chinese nor American.”
At an event in Paris in December, LeCun said that Meta would work with the new company, although it would not invest in the company. “This new architecture is a project that Mark Zuckerberg really likes. He thinks that maybe this is the future,” LeCun said.
In an interview with MIT Technology Review published in January, the AI pioneer said he disagreed with some of Zuckerberg’s decisions, including closing the robotics team within FAIR.
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Yann LeCun also criticized Alexandr Wang, Scale AI’s former CEO, after Wang briefly became his boss following the restructuring of Meta’s AI department. “He has no experience with research or how to do research, how to conduct it. Or what would be attractive or repulsive to a researcher,” LeCun said in an interview with the Financial Times in January.
“You don’t tell a researcher what to do,” LeCun said. “You definitely don’t tell a researcher like me what to do.”