Firms & Funds

In brief: IBM unveils $500m AI venture fund

The enterprise AI venture fund will back AI companies from early-stage to 'hyper-growth' start-ups.

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  • IBM is the sole investor in the fund
  • The new fund will invest from early stage to ‘hyper growth’ start-ups
  • The move follows IBM’s investment in Hugging Face

IBM announced that it has launched a $500 million venture fund “to invest in a range of AI companies – from early-stage to hyper-growth startups — focused on accelerating generative AI technology and research for the enterprise.”

IBM is the sole investor in the fund.

“AI is slated to unlock nearly $16 trillion in productivity by 2030,” IBM senior vice president Rob Thomas said in a statement. “With the launch of the IBM Enterprise AI Venture Fund, we’re opening another channel to harness the enormous potential of the AI revolution into tangible, positive outcomes for IBM and the companies we invest in.”

Based in New York, IBM is a provider of global hybrid cloud and AI, and consulting services.

The new fund comes on the heels of IBM’s August investment in Hugging Face, which operates an open-source collaboration platform for the machine learning community building the future of AI. IBM participated in the $235 million Series D funding round for the company.