Physical Intelligence seeks to raise $1 billion as AI robotics valuation hits $11 billion

Physical Intelligence is reportedly in talks to raise $1 billion, again | TechCrunch

Physical Intelligence, the two-year-old San Francisco robotics startup, is in discussions to raise about $1 billion in new funding at a valuation exceeding $11 billion, according to Bloomberg. The deal would effectively double the company's $5.6 billion valuation in just four months. Founders Fund is set to participate with Lightspeed Venture Partners also in talks to invest alongside returning backers Thrive Capital and Lux Capital, Bloomberg reported. The deal is still in early stages and details could change, noted the outlet. TechCrunch visited Physical Intelligence's headquarters in January, where co-founder Sergey Levine described the company's ambition simply: "Think of it like ChatGPT, but for robots." At the time, the company had raised just over $1 billion and employed about 80 people working to build general-purpose AI models that can power robots to perform a wide variety of tasks, from folding laundry to peeling vegetables. Co-founder Lachy Groom told TechCrunch the company has no timeline for commercialization, an unusual posture that its investors don't seem to mind. "There's no limit to how much money we can really put to work," Groom said. "There's always more compute you can throw at the problem."

AI Robotics Lab in Talks to Raise $1 Billion at $11 Billion Valuation

Physical Intelligence, a two-year-old robotics startup founded by AI academics and former Google DeepMind researchers, is discussing a new funding round of about $1 billion that would bring the company's valuation to more than $11 billion including dollars raised, according to people familiar with the matter. The deal would effectively double the startup's valuation in four months, as it works to build artificial intelligence models that can power robots capable of performing a variety of tasks. The company's last funding round, a $600 million haul, valued Physical Intelligence at $5.6 billion. Peter Thiel's Founders Fund is set to participate in the round, said some of the people, who asked not to be identified because the information is private. Lightspeed Venture Partners is also in talks to invest, as are previous backers Thrive Capital and Lux Capital. The deal talks are still early and the details could change, the people said. A representative for Physical Intelligence did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Representatives for the VC firms declined to comment. So far, Physical Intelligence has raised more than $1 billion in capital. Investors include Amazon.com Inc. founder Jeff Bezos, Alphabet Inc.'s independent growth fund CapitalG, Redpoint Ventures, BOND and Avenir Growth. Venture capital investors have recently flocked to companies building AI models focused on the physical world. Startups working on humanoid robots include Skild AI, which was recently valued at more than $14 billion by investors including Lightspeed, and Figure AI, valued at $39 billion. Big Tech players are also piling into robotics, including Alphabet Inc.'s DeepMind, Apple Inc. and Meta Platforms Inc. Physical Intelligence is developing artificial intelligence software to help robots learn a wide range of movements. The San Francisco-based startup has deployed its software on robotic arms in a testing capacity to perform tasks such as fold clothes, make coffee and assemble boxes. The ultimate goal, the company has said, is building models that enable robots to perform any function requested by the user through "vision-language models," in the same way that large-language models complete digital tasks on command. In recent weeks, the company has released new research about improving memory in robotic software models as well as performance on precise tasks that require careful and detailed manipulation of objects.