US-based machine learning technology provider H2O.ai has secured $100m in a series E round featuring graphic processing unit producer Nvidia and insurance provider New York Life.
Commonwealth Bank of Australia led the round, which included fellow financial services firms Wells Fargo and Goldman Sachs, the latter through its asset management business. Venture capital firm Crane Venture Partners filled out the round, which valued the company at $1.7bn.
Founded in 2012 as 0xdata before rebranding two years later, H20.ai provides an open-source AI software development platform which allows data scientists to create artificial intelligence models for a variety of functions. It plans to use the capital to scale its sales, marketing and partnerships worldwide.
The round brings the company’s total funding to over $250m, it said. Insurance group Ping An’s Global Voyager Fund co-led its $72.5m series D round with Goldman Sachs in August 2019, with Wells Fargo and VC firm Nexus Venture Partners also participating.
Nvidia and Wells Fargo had previously led a $40m series C round for H2O.ai in 2017 with participation from New York Life and fellow insurance provider Transamerica’s corporate venturing unit, Transamerica Ventures, in addition to Crane Venture Partners and Nexus Venture Partners.
The company had secured $20m in a 2015 series B round led by Paxion Capital Partners, with Capital One Growth Ventures, a vehicle for financial services firm Capital One, Nexus Venture Partners and Transamerica also investing.
Transamerica Ventures alao took part in H2O.ai’s $8.9m series A round in 2014. It was co-led by private investors Rakesh Matur, Michael Marks and Ash Bhardwaj, with Nexus Venture Partners in tow.
Sri Ambati, H2O.ai’s founder and chief executive, said: “H2O.ai is picking winners in every vertical on every continent and making them AI superpowers to take on the tech giants with the H2O AI Cloud. Our innovative maker culture and customer obsession have won the trust and love of our customers and they have led every growth funding round at H2O.ai.”
