Bill Gates' daughter has also ventured into the AI business, focusing on a fashion e-commerce startup that has just received an $8 million investment.
The AI startup project of Bill Gates' youngest daughter has just secured $8 million in financing.
Although her father didn't contribute a single cent, a group of celebrities such as Hailey Bieber and Kris Jenner have all joined in.
It seems that people always have to give face to the tech giant. (doge)
Let's take a look at what kind of AI company Phoebe Gates, the daughter of Gates, has founded.
A Brand - New Online Shopping Method
In September this year, Phia, a startup founded by Phoebe Gates and Sophia Kianni, successfully secured $8 million in seed - round financing.
What's even more eye - catching is that the shareholder list actually includes two big names in the entertainment industry: Kris Jenner, the mother of Kim Kardashian, and Hailey Bieber, the wife of Justin Bieber.
The company officially stated that it plans to use this funds to "assemble a world - class team" in the fields of engineering, artificial intelligence research, product, and marketing to accelerate the next stage of growth.
As a startup, Phia's ability to attract the attention of these celebrities is somewhat due to the halo of the "Gates family".
On the other hand, Phia's own characteristics are indeed quite special.
Although its technological foundation is still AI, it doesn't focus on chips or robots. Instead, it focuses on -
AI Fashion.
In April this year, Phia, an AI shopping assistant jointly developed by Phoebe and Sophia, was officially launched.
Less than half a year after its launch, Phia has already accumulated over 600,000 users.
The core function of this app is to instantly compare the prices of new and second - hand products while you're browsing items, helping you buy your favorite clothing, shoes, or accessories at the lowest price.
In terms of form, Phia can be used either as an iOS app or as a browser extension.
After successful installation, as soon as you enter a product page, a prominent button will appear: "Should I buy this?"
After clicking, Phia will quickly scan the web page, collect data from thousands of shopping channels, compare the new and old prices of the same or similar products, and give a judgment - whether the current price is too high, normal, or worth buying immediately.
Phia said that its database has been connected to top resale platforms such as The RealReal, Vestiaire Collective, ThredUp, StockX, eBay, and Poshmark, covering over 250 million products.
In addition, its algorithm was self - developed by a team of engineers from tech companies such as Pinterest, Millennium, Meta, and Amazon.
Its ecosystem is also maturing rapidly. Phia has been launched on over 40,000 shopping websites and has over 5,000 direct brand partners.
On the official website, the two founders explained the original intention of the product like this:
We hope to create a brand - new shopping method that allows people to find their favorite items while also keeping their wallets intact. Phia's vision is simple: to make you the smartest shopper in the room.
Meanwhile, Phoebe and Sophia also launched a podcast called The Burnouts in April this year, inviting top experts in the business and cultural fields to have conversations in each episode.
Currently, this channel has 140,000 followers on YouTube. It's worth noting that this traffic can also feed back to the core product, Phia, in the future.
From a market perspective, consumers really need a more efficient online shopping model.
In the past decade or so, thanks to the maturity of mobile Internet, the scale of online shopping has experienced an unprecedented explosive growth.
Data shows that between 2010 and 2025, global e - commerce sales soared from about $0.6 trillion to about $6.4 trillion, more than ten times the original amount.
Meanwhile, online shopping has changed from a "new channel" to a part of daily life - there are nearly 3 billion online shoppers globally.
However, in sharp contrast to the rapid growth of scale is the stagnation of technology.
After more than a decade, users still follow the same old path when shopping: Search → Browse → Add to Cart → Checkout → Receive Goods → Rate.
This process has hardly changed since the establishment of Amazon and Taobao. The interface, logic, and interaction of e - commerce are basically the same as they were in the 2010s.
Here comes the contradiction: the number of product SKUs is skyrocketing, and consumers' search requests are becoming more and more frequent, but the platform connecting the two ends still lacks a truly efficient information screening mechanism.
Specifically, people are spending more and more time doing research and are easily confused by various discount strategies.
As a result, people spend more and more time "doing research" but are still often confused by various full - reduction and coupon - return strategies.
The emergence of tools like Phia may allow users to break out of the information cocoon of recommendation algorithms and consume in a more active and efficient way.
After covering the key points, let's talk about the birth of Phia, which is actually a quite interesting story.
The two founders of this company, Phoebe and Sophia, were originally just roommates randomly assigned to the same dormitory at Stanford University.
Unexpectedly, a "random match" became the starting point of their entrepreneurial partnership.
Due to their common interests in topics such as climate and business, they hit it off soon and decided to start a big business together.
Like many ambitious Stanford alumni, they transformed their dormitory into an "entrepreneurial laboratory" - the kitchen was covered with inspiring articles, the floor was piled with notes for calling customers, and the whiteboard was filled with creative ideas.
Among all the topics they discussed, one word always came up: clothes.
Phoebe and Sophia are typical "shopaholics". Their dormitory was filled with packages, shoe boxes, and un - tagged coats.
But every time they went shopping, they had to do a lot of research - checking prices, comparing platforms, looking at discounts, and searching for reviews. It was almost like an information war.
Later, they found that almost everyone had this kind of "shopping anxiety" -
"People have suffered from doing research for a long time."
So, they decided to solve this problem themselves.
Their entrepreneurial journey was quite smooth. Soon, the project earned its first pot of gold, an early investment from Soma Capital and a Stanford professor - that was the prototype of Phia.
In 2023, they moved to New York and officially established Phia.
The company name is actually a combination of the two roommates' names, Phoebe + Sophia.
Interestingly, there was originally a third empty bed in that dormitory, but no one moved in later.
Just think, if there had been another roommate at that time, the company might have been called "Phia + X".
Phoebe and Sophia
Let's stop talking about the third roommate we've never met and focus back on the two founders.
Although one of Phia's founders has the halo of the "Gates family", the resume of the other founder, Sophia, is also quite impressive.
Sophia was born in 2001 and grew up in Virginia, USA.
When she was in middle school, she began to be concerned about climate issues.
One night, when the starry sky was blocked by thick smog, she described that moment as "a signal that the world is warming up at an alarming rate".
From then on, she decided to devote herself to environmental protection campaigns.
In 2020, she founded a website called Climate Cardinals, a public - welfare platform that translates climate - change - related information into multiple languages to eliminate information barriers.
Sophia's efforts soon caught the attention of the United Nations.
In July 2020, United Nations Secretary - General António Guterres appointed her as one of the seven members of the United Nations Youth Advisory Group on Climate Change to provide advice on global climate action.
At that time, she was only 18 years old.
After that, she participated in many important international conferences as a United Nations representative, including COP26, COP27, COP28, etc.
In 2021, Sophia entered Stanford University, majoring in Science, Technology, and Society (STS), an interdisciplinary major.
There, she met her future entrepreneurial partner, Phoebe Gates.
In 2002, Phoebe was born in Washington, USA. She is the youngest of Bill Gates' three children.
In 2022, she was admitted to Stanford University, majoring in law and biological science and minoring in African studies.
During her time at school, Phoebe was also very active on the Internet, often sharing campus life, fashion collocations, and social issues on social media.
Currently, she has over 500,000 followers on Instagram.
However, compared to being an Internet celebrity, Phoebe's entrepreneurial idea during this period may be the thing that worries her father the most.
Born with the halo of the "Gates family", Phoebe is destined to be in the spotlight of the scrutiny of the "second - generation Gates". Therefore, she wants to blaze her own trail even more.
She made it very clear in an interview:
I won't rely on my family's halo for the rest of my life. I want to start my own business.
So, when the prototype of Phia started to take shape, she excitedly went to her father and proposed the idea of "dropping out of school to start a business".
Unexpectedly, this man who dropped out of school to start a business in a garage back then flatly refused his daughter this time.
Are you sure you want to do this?
Phoebe was stunned at that time and a bit confused - clearly her father founded Microsoft by dropping out of school. Why couldn't she do the same?
They always say you have to finish your studies first and can't just drop out to start a company... It's funny because that's what my father did, and that's why I can afford the tuition at Stanford.
Since she couldn't drop out, she decided to graduate early...
So, she simply completed all her courses one year earlier and obtained her degree.
Of course, it was later proven that Mr. Gates didn't oppose her starting a business; he just opposed dropping out of school.
After really starting to work on Phia, although her father didn't give her money, he still became her "behind - the - scenes advisor".
When I'm not sure about something, I'll call my parents. For example, should I hire this person? How should I expand? Although my father isn't a "fashion queen", I ask him about strategic issues.
Reference Links:
[1]https://www.businessinsider.com/phoebe-gates-sophia-kiannis-phia-cofounders-ai-fashion-startup-2025-10
[2]https://fortune.com/2025/09/17/exclusive-phia-founded-by-phoebe-gates-and-sophia-kianni-raises-8-million-seed-round-led-by-kleiner-perkins/
[3]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hIEjxknAU0w
[4]https://phia.com/?fbclid=PAZXh0bgNhZW0CMTEAAaelLYBbi0O2FEjfVLnW_WmASUQ_BKCoA4pYlF5-QyZxwA2hRUS7_p0IEhVPQQ_aem_qYmj9HCr2cf_pWUzb7865g
This article is from the WeChat official account “Quantum Bit”. Author: Jay. Republished by 36Kr with permission.