AI21 Labs $1.4B valuation after $155M funding 🚀

Let's dive into the exciting journey of AI21 Labs, a start-up from Tel Aviv, that's making some serious waves in the AI world. They've just secured a cool $155M in their Series C funding round. Yes, you read that right. Their total funding is now a whopping $283M, pushing their valuation to a sizzling $1.4B.

• AI21 Labs was founded by Amnon Shashua, founder of Mobileye, Yoav Shoham and Ori Goshen. Shoham is a Stanford emeritus professor with a knack for selling companies to Google, while Goshen is a seasoned entrepreneur. Their flagship product is AI21 Studio, a platform for creating custom text-based business apps.

• AI21 Labs plans to use their recent funding to kick their R&D efforts into high gear and further develop their AI offerings. They're also looking to expand their workforce and build more partnerships in the tech ecosystem.

• They've recently hired a former exec from Google and Databricks, Pankaj Dugar, to strengthen their team.

• The journey ahead is still daunting. And AI21 Labs' research suggests that training a text-generating model can cost up to $1.6M. Add to that the hosting costs to keep the models running.

Shoham assures that they've grown responsibly and are committed to delivering the most trustworthy AI possible. Well, we can't wait to see what they come up with next! 🚀