Blooming flowers include Dust, a startup founded by former OpenAI employees. Dust is nearing a $5 million funding round led by Sequoia Capital that will value it at $30 million to $40 million, two people with knowledge of the situation said. The round was competitive, with term sheets offering valuations as high as double, one of the people said.
Perplexity AI, a startup created by former employees of OpenAI, Google and Meta, is raising between $20 and $25 million, led by NEA, which values the company at around $150 million, two people familiar with the situation said. . And LangChain, a startup working on software that helps other companies incorporate AI into their products, has raised funds from Benchmark, a person with knowledge of the matter said.
That follows the $13 billion OpenAI raised from Microsoft, including $10 billion in January, and $300 million raised this year by Anthropic, another artificial intelligence startup.
Dust and LangChain declined to comment. Various aspects of funding rounds were previously reported by Business Insider, Information and Newcomer.
At Y Combinator, the startup incubator, at least 50 of the 218 companies in the current program are working on generative AI, according to a count by Truewind, an AI accounting startup that is part of the program. Alex Lee, CEO of Truewind, said that ChatGPT had helped investors, prospects and potential employees understand the possibilities of the technology.
“Before, you’d come in and say, ‘We’re doing something with AI,’ and it’s hard to imagine exactly what that looks like,” Lee said. “Now, they say, ‘Oh, I’ve played with ChaptGPT, and I can imagine how I could use this in my world.'”