Overview
- Andreessen Horowitz and Lightspeed co-led the $475 million seed round, with Sequoia, Lux Capital, DCVC and Jeff Bezos participating, and Rao investing $10 million on the same terms.
- The financing is described by Rao as the first tranche of a potential raise of up to $1 billion as the company scopes its plans.
- Unconventional AI aims to build a new computing substrate for AI inspired by biological systems to drastically cut power use versus today’s digital architectures.
- Rao says the team is exploring silicon-fabricated, likely analog approaches that tap nonlinear circuit dynamics, considering neuromorphic ideas without committing to brain-mimicking designs.
- The company expects several years of R&D with no product within two years and plans to publish early research in the coming months, citing soaring AI energy demand as the core motivation.