Sakana AI

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Sakana AI Co, Ltd. is a Japanese artificial intelligence company. It is based in Tokyo, Japan.

 Overview 
Sakana AI works on research in collective intelligence and new methods for creating AI systems. The name of the company comes from the Japanese word “sakana,” which means fish. This name is used as an example of many simple parts working together, like a school of fish, to create intelligent behavior.

The company was founded in 2023 by David Ha, Llion Jones, and Ren Ito. Llion Jones is known as one of the authors of the important AI research paper Attention Is All You Need, which was written while he worked at Google.

In its first funding round, Sakana AI raised $30 million from investors including Lux Capital and Khosla Ventures. In 2024, the company raised about $200 million in a larger funding round. Investors included Mitsubishi UFJ, Sumitomo Mitsui Financial Group, Mizuho Financial Group, Itochu, KDDI, Nomura Holdings, and Nvidia.

In 2024, the company developed a method to create new AI models by combining several existing models. Sakana AI believes this method can help more people build AI systems without needing large computers.

Sakana AI is also working on a project called the “AI Scientist.” This project aims to use AI to help automate parts of scientific research.

In 2024, Sakana AI became a "unicorn" company (a startup worth more than $1 billion). It reached this value faster than any other Japanese startup in history.

 References 

Category:Technology companies of Japan
Category:Companies based in Tokyo