rewrite this title OpenAI’s startup empire: The companies backed by its venture fund | TechCrunch

Since its founding in 2021, OpenAI Startup Fund has raised $175 million for its main fund and secured an additional $114 million through five separate special purpose vehicles, which are investment pools for specific opportunities.

Unlike many sizable tech companies, OpenAI says it doesn’t use the company’s money to invest in startups.  The ChatGPT maker says its OpenAI Startup Fund is raised from outside investors. This includes participation from significant OpenAI backer Microsoft, as well as “other OpenAI partners,” according to the fund’s website.

The OpenAI Startup Fund, which is managed by a dedicated team, has so far invested in over a dozen startups, according to data providers PitchBook and Crunchbase and TechCrunch’s research. 

The following companies have announced investments from the OpenAI Startup Fund, organized alphabetically.

1X: This Norwegian humanoid robot startup raised $23.5 million in a deal led by the OpenAI Startup Fund and Tiger Global in early 2023. However, OpenAI’s fund wasn’t named as a participant in the company when it announced its $100 million Series B in January.  

Ambience Healthcare: This AI-powered medical note-taking startup announced a $70 million Series B in February 2024, co-led by OpenAI’s fund and Kleiner Perkins. Ambience is among a number of startups, including Abridge, Nabla, Suki, and Microsoft-owned Nuance, that are building AI medical scribes.

Anysphere (aka Cursor): In October 2023, OpenAI’s fund led the $8 million seed round into Anysphere, the maker of AI-powered coding assistant Cursor. OpenAI hasn’t been named as an investor in the company’s subsequent rounds.

Chai Discovery: This startup, which is developing an open source AI foundational model for drug discovery, raised a $30 million in seed round led by Thrive Capital and OpenAI’s fund last September. The deal valued the 6-month-old Chai Discovery at $150 million.  

Class Companion: This edtech startup raised a $4 million seed round in 2023 from OpenAI’s fund and a host of angels. It helps teachers provide quick, personalized feedback to their students.  

Descript: The collaborative audio and video editing platform raised $50 million in a Series C round led by OpenAI’s fund shortly after ChatGPT was introduced to the world in late 2022. Other investors in the round included Andreessen Horowitz, Redpoint Ventures, Spark Capital, and ex-Y Combinator partner Daniel Gross. Descript hasn’t reported any other capital raises since its Series C.

Figure AI: AI robotics startup Figure raised a $675 million Series B in February 2024 from Nvidia, OpenAI’s fund, Microsoft, and others. The round valued the company at $2.6 billion. Figure AI is now reportedly in talks to raise $1.5 billion at a $39.5 billion valuation.

Ghost Autonomy: This maker of autonomous driving software raised a $55 million Series E in April 2023, and OpenAI’s fund invested $5 million of that, according to PitchBook data. But the investment didn’t work out. A year later the company shut down.

Harvey AI: This legal tech startup raised a $21 million Series A in April 2023 from OpenAI’s fund and others. The fund also participated in three subsequent rounds, including last month’s $300 million Series D, which valued Harvey at $3 billion.

Heeyo: Educational AI chatbot for kids Heeyo announced that it raised $3.5 million from OpenAI’s fund, Alexa Fund, Pear VC, and other investors in August.

Kick: This company is developing AI agents that it says can “self-drive” bookkeeping processes. It raised a $9 million seed round co-led by General Catalyst and OpenAI’s fund in October.

Mem: This AI-powered note-taking startup raised a $23.5 million Series A round in November 2022, led by OpenAI’s fund. Mem hasn’t reported any subsequent funding rounds.  

Milo: This startup is developing an AI-powered personal assistant that helps parents organize and keep track of their kids’ activities. Milo raised an undisclosed amount of pre-seed and seed funding from OpenAI’s fund, YC, and others.

Physical Intelligence: Foundational software for robots startup Physical Intelligence raised a $70 million seed round last March. OpenAI’s fund was part of that and also participated in the company’s $400 million Series A that valued the company at more than $2 billion. Other investors in the latest round included Lux Capital, Sequoia, and Jeff Bezos.

Speak: This AI-powered language learning app developer raised a $27 million Series B round in November 2022, led by OpenAI’s fund. In December, the fund participated in Speak’s $78 million Series C, which valued the company at $1 billion.

Thrive AI: Huffington Post founder Arianna Huffington and OpenAI Startup Fund announced last July that they teamed up on investing and building this “AI health coach” startup. Thrive AI aimed to raise $10 million, according to a regulatory filing.

Unify: This sales technology startup secured about $19 million in seed and Series A capital from the OpenAI Startup Fund, Thrive Capital, and Emergence.