Google has invested approximately $300 million in artificial intelligence begin-up Anthropic, whose biggest investor is Alameda Research, the crypto hedge fund of disgraced crypto boss Sam Bankman-Fried.
According to a Friday report from the Financial Times, Google invested round $three hundred million in Anthropic in late 2022 no matter its ties to Bankman-Fried, the disgraced founding father of cryptocurrency change FTX.
In return for the cash, Google got a 10 percentage stake within the organisation. Separately, Anthropic introduced this week that Google Cloud is its “desired cloud company,” with the businesses “co-develop AI computing systems.”
Prior to Google’s funding, Anthropic had already raised extra than $seven-hundred million. Bankman-Fried’s Alameda Research is the largest investor within the AI begin-up, which put in $500 million earlier than submitting for bankruptcy final yr. FTX’s financial ruin property has flagged Anthropic as an asset that can assist lenders with recoveries.
Formed in 2021, Anthropic is growing Claude, a widespread-cause artificial intelligence chatbot. Claude is a capacity rival to OpenAI’s ChatGPT, which has made waves throughout the web global over the past couple of months. Claude has now not but been launched publicly.
Both OpenAI and Anthropic are seeking to make developments in generative AI, state-of-the-art computer packages that may write scripts and create art in seconds.Anthropic says it’s centered on AI protection, calling itself “an A.I. Safety and studies corporation.” It writes on its internet site, “We display that language fashions can learn to observe a fixed of simple, herbal language principles thru self-development, and we use this new method to teach a extra harmless assistant.”
Meanwhile, Google’s investment was made via its cloud division. The FT report referred to that the tech massive may additionally plan to carry Anthropic’s information-in depth computing work to its records centers as part of an effort to seize up with the lead Microsoft has taken within the fast-growing AI marketplace way to its paintings with OpenAI.
Alameda Research became a cryptocurrency buying and selling firm, co-based via SBF in September 2017. The organization has reportedly made a complete of 222 investments in the 5 years of its existence.
FTX and its organization of crypto corporations filed for Chapter eleven financial ruin in early November. Sam Bankman-Fried, the disgraced founder of FTX, was later arrested in The Bahamas after US prosecutors formally filed criminal prices against him. He changed into subsequently extradited to the USA where he turned into released from prison after posting a $250m bond in a New York court docket.
Notably, there was co-mingling of budget between the 2 companies. Alameda was capable of quietly use client budget from FTX the use of a backdoor that allowed the mortgage to fly underneath the radar of investors, personnel, and auditors.
