Safe Superintelligence (SSI), a new AI venture in which Ilya Sutskever, the former co-founder of OpenAI, will work is ready to invest $1 billion, according to Reuters. It’s going to be used to invent higher artificial intelligence that would be beyond human comparison.
Though the actual value of the funding round hasn’t been revealed to the public it is estimated that Safe Superintelligence is worth $5 billion. This rather large amount of investment is to be used to recruit equally brilliant personnel to work within the company. SSI plans to have engineering and research departments in major centers that may include: Palo Alto California and Tel Aviv Israel.
The funding round that took place and was able to attract big names such as Andreessen Horowitz, Sequoia Capital, DST Global and SV Angel. Also, other funds from NFDG invested in the round thus enhancing the investment intensity.
SSI Founders and Roles
Safe Superintelligence (SSI) was founded in June 2024 by Ilya Sutskever, Daniel Gross and Daniel Levy. Currently, Levy is employed with SSI as the company’s co-founder and optimization lead after working at OpenAI for a short time. Gross an old bird in business is the technology strategist of the enterprise. He is the cofounder of the now-Apple acquired AI start up company known as Cue.
Sutskever, who left OpenAI job in May to establish Safe Superintelligence, posted his decision on X, he wrote, “After nearly eight years at OpenAI, I’ve decided to join the OpenAI team,” While I’m excited about this launch and some people might think I was pushed out from OpenAI, the actual reality is quite the opposite; OpenAI has been nothing short of a miracle and I’m sure that OpenAI
Consequently, OpenAI’s CEO, Sam Altman, described it on X as follows: “Ilya and OpenAI are going to separate now That is very sad for me because Ilya is an easily one of the greatest minds of our generation, the luminaries of our field, and my friend.
The departure came after there was internal wrangles at OpenAI where the board claimed that Altman was not being clear enough. Some of the sourced suggested that Sutskever was working on the safety aspect of AI while others such as Altman, explored on the development of newer technologies. After much ado, Altman was restored back to the American Color Company in march.
Vision for SSI
Safe Superintelligence is purposed to bring about ‘superintelligence,’ which can be described as AI systems that are smarter than human beings. The business itself is described in the company’s blog in the following way: “Our focus is too narrow to be side-tracked by management overhead or product cycles, and our business model makes safety, security and progress immune to short-term commercial pressure.”
This funding surge aligns with a broader increase in AI investments. From April to June, AI start up funding soared to $24 billion, more than double the previous quarter’s total, according to Crunchbase. The first half of 2024 saw $35.6 billion invested in AI start ups, marking a 24% rise from the $28.7 billion in the same period last year.
+ There are no comments
Add yours