Flapping Airplanes raises 1 billion dollars at 6 billion dollar valuation

Artificial intelligence research startup Flapping Airplanes raised 1 billion dollars in a Series A funding round at a reported 6 billion dollar valuation on Wednesday. TechCrunch, Dealroom, SiliconANGLE, Bloomberg, and Quartz all reported on the fundraising round. TechCrunch reported that venture capital firms Index Ventures and Lux Capital co-led the financing round. [1][2][3][4][5][6]

The one-year-old lab aims to develop artificial intelligence models without ingesting half the internet, according to TechCrunch. The company focuses on solving data efficiency problems by training large models with less data, which can benefit data constrained domains such as robotics and scientific discovery. [1][9]

The new financing arrives nine months after the startup launched with a 180 million dollar seed round. That initial round was backed by GV, Sequoia Capital, and Index Ventures. The seed funding valued the company at 1.5 billion dollars, meaning the new Series A round quadrupled its valuation. [1]

The company name acts as a metaphor for its approach to artificial intelligence research. Rather than relying on brute force strategies with ever-larger datasets, the startup seeks to develop models that learn with higher efficiency. The research lab commits to long-horizon projects that are expected to require 5 to 10 years. [9]