Just now, Yann LeCun raised 7 billion, and Jensen Huang invested.
On March 10, 2026, it was reported that AMI Labs, a world model startup co - founded by Turing Award winner and former Meta Chief Scientist Yann LeCun, officially announced a financing of $1.03 billion (approximately RMB 7.087 billion), and declared that the company would "officially launch".
This round of financing was jointly led by five institutions and angel investors, including Cathay Innovation and Bezos Expeditions (the family investment company of Amazon founder Jeff Bezos). Strategic investors include well - known enterprises such as Nvidia, Toyota Ventures, and Temasek. Other investors include former Google CEO Eric Schmidt and Samsung.
According to TechCrunch, the pre - investment valuation of AMI Labs for this financing was $3.5 billion (approximately RMB 24.082 billion), and the post - investment valuation has not been disclosed yet.
AMI Labs was officially established in January this year and is headquartered in Paris (which is also Yann LeCun's birthplace). Yann LeCun serves as the chairman of AMI, while Alexandre LeBrun, the co - founder of AI medical company Nabla, serves as the CEO of AMI. In an interview with TechCrunch, LeBrun said, "My prediction is that 'world models' will become the next hot buzzword. Six months from now, every company will claim to be a world model to raise funds."
Alexandre LeBrun
AMI has a luxurious lineup of co - founders. Xie Saining, a former Meta AI research scientist and an assistant professor at New York University, serves as the Chief Science Officer; Pascale Fung, a professor in the Department of Electronic and Computer Engineering and the Department of Computer Science and Engineering at the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, serves as the Chief Research and Innovation Officer; Laurent Solly, the former vice - president of Meta in Europe, serves as the Chief Operating Officer of AMI; and Michael Rabbat, the former director of Meta AI research, serves as the vice - president of global models.
From left to right: Xie Saining, Pascale Fung, Laurent Solly, Michael Rabbat
The official website shows that AMI is developing a model that can learn the abstract representation of real - world sensor data, ignore unpredictable details, and make predictions in the representation space. This system can understand the real world, has long - term memory, can reason and plan, and is safe and controllable. It can be applied to scenarios with high requirements for reliability, controllability, and safety, such as industrial process control, automation, wearable devices, robotics, and healthcare.
AMI official website
Currently, AMI has offices in Paris, New York, Montreal, and Singapore. Its official website is recruiting positions such as AI scientists and engineers. LeBrun also revealed that AMI will open - source a large amount of code. "We believe that we can make faster progress through open - source, and it is in our best interest to build a community and a research ecosystem."
Conclusion: The financing enthusiasm for world models is rising, but it is still in the early verification stage
As AMI CEO LeBrun said, the financing enthusiasm for the world model track is indeed rising. On February 19, World Labs, a spatial intelligence startup founded by Fei - Fei Li, also announced the completion of a $1 billion (approximately RMB 6.88 billion) financing, with a post - investment valuation of $5 billion (approximately RMB 34.4 billion).
However, both world models and spatial intelligence are currently in the theoretical exploration and early verification stage from 0 to 1. Whether world models can truly become the next wave of AI still awaits the answers from technology and time.
This article is from the WeChat official account "zhidxcom" (ID: zhidxcom). The author is Chen Junda, and the editor is Xin Yuan. It is published by 36Kr with authorization.