Artificial intelligence startup Flourish secured $500 million in a new funding round on Tuesday, pushing the company valuation to $2.5 billion, according to chief executive Thomas Reardon. The massive financing event establishes Flourish as one of the most heavily capitalized private enterprises in the San Francisco technology sector, drawing capital from multiple venture funds during the third quarter.
Lux Capital and GV backed the financing round to fund critical engineering work on brain-inspired artificial intelligence systems designed to draw significantly less power than standard models currently deployed in the industry. Traditional AI hardware burns through massive amounts of electricity to process data center workloads across 24 hours a day, prompting Flourish to build systems intended to cut that power draw by mimicking biological neural networks using a portion of the $500 million.
Chief executive Thomas Reardon detailed the corporate strategy during the funding announcement involving the 2 primary institutional backers based on the West Coast. "We are on the brink of a technological revolution that could redefine how AI is integrated into various sectors," Reardon said in a statement regarding the $500 million transaction finalized on Tuesday. "Our focus on brain-inspired systems is about responsible innovation that benefits society as a whole," he added to reporters.
The $500 million capital injection from Lux Capital and GV will specifically target the Flourish engineering division working on systems that mimic biological neural networks to reduce electricity consumption for large-scale data centers. Flourish operates with a valuation of $2.5 billion following the transaction, though the enterprise has not disclosed how many engineers are currently on staff or what exact percentage of equity the 2 venture capital firms acquired during the 4-week negotiation period.
Thomas Reardon and his technical team at Flourish are now tasked with deploying the capital effectively across the research department over the next 12 months to accelerate hardware prototypes. The company has not disclosed when the funding round officially closes or when the new brain-inspired hardware will ship to commercial customers, leaving 2 major operational milestones undefined as the San Francisco startup continues development.
