US-based incubator and venture capital fund AI Fund launched yesterday with $175m of capital from limited partners including telecommunications and internet firm SoftBank.
AI Fund will look to build companies that can use artificial intelligence to “improve human life”. In addition to SoftBank, it has received commitments from venture capital firms New Enterprise Associates, Sequoia Capital and Greylock Partners.
The fund was formed by Andrew Ng, co-founder and co-chair of online education provider Coursera. Ng, who also oversaw internet company Baidu’s AI work as chief scientist between 2014 and March 2017, is AI Fund’s general partner.
Eva Wang and Steven Syverud are partners at the fund, and the latter is also its chief operating officer.
Ng said in a blog post AI Fund will use systematic processes to build companies and is starting out with three AI-powered projects. The first, adaptive manufacturing technology startup Landing.AI, was announced last month.
AI Fund intends to invest in those technologies as they mature and become fully-fledged businesses, though it has not given information regarding how much it could invest or how it would be structured in relation to funding from external backers.