David Silver Raises $1.1 Billion for Human-Free AI

A Spectacular Fundraising for Ineffable Intelligence

Ineffable Intelligence, a newly established artificial intelligence lab in the UK founded by David Silver, a former researcher at DeepMind, has successfully raised $1.1 billion. This impressive sum has allowed the company to reach a valuation of $5.1 billion. The lab is entering the race for next-generation AI models, with the ambition to surpass current large language models.

Ineffable Intelligence's newly launched website reveals that the goal is to develop a "superlearner." This system would be capable of discovering knowledge and skills without relying on human data, using reinforcement learning. This method, which enables AI systems to learn through trial and error rather than by studying examples provided by humans, is David Silver's area of expertise.

The Legacy of DeepMind and Silver's Ambition

A professor at University College London, Silver led the reinforcement learning team at DeepMind, a Google-owned company, for over a decade. He left this position to found Ineffable Intelligence. At DeepMind, Silver contributed to the development of programs that defeated professional players in chess and Go, learning solely through experience without being fed human strategies or game archives. The most notable of these programs was AlphaZero. Ineffable Intelligence hopes that its superlearner will similarly discover all knowledge through its own experience.

Despite the lack of experience of its superlearner, the company is not short on ambition. The Ineffable Intelligence website states that if this project succeeds, it will represent a scientific breakthrough on par with Darwin's: where his law explained all of Life, our law will explain and build all of Intelligence.

Silver's Personal Motivations

In a personal note published on the company's blog, Silver describes Ineffable Intelligence as "the work of his life." He also told Wired that "all the money I make from Ineffable will go to high-impact charities that save as many lives as possible." Although it is unclear how, when, or how much the company will make money, this has not hindered fundraising efforts.

Funding Details and London's Influence

According to Wired, the funding round was led by Sequoia Capital and Lightspeed Venture Partners, with participation from Index Ventures, Google, Nvidia, and others. Among these other investors are the British Business Bank and Sovereign AI, the recently launched sovereign venture capital fund for AI in the UK.

By achieving pentacorn status—meaning companies valued at over $5 billion—Ineffable Intelligence joins the ranks of AI companies founded by renowned researchers whose names have attracted funding rounds so large they have been dubbed coconut rounds, a humorous escalation of the "seed" funding round. Last month, AMI Labs, co-founded by Turing Award winner and former Meta AI scientist Yann LeCun, raised $1.03 billion at a pre-money valuation of $3.5 billion.

There may be other companies in this mold. Recursive Superintelligence, co-founded by former DeepMind principal scientist Tim Rocktäschel and incorporated in the UK, reportedly raised $500 million, with enough demand to push that amount to $1 billion.

Although Recursive also has ties to the United States, these companies suggest a growing momentum around London as an AI hub. This is partly due to the continued presence of DeepMind after its acquisition by Google in 2014. But it’s not just DeepMind. Jeff Bezos's AI lab, Project Prometheus, is said to be in talks to secure office space near Google's AI hub.

This also translates into a powerful alumni network, with several former DeepMind employees apparently ready to join Ineffable's executive team.