Two-year-old San Francisco robotics startup Physical Intelligence is in talks to raise about $1 billion in new funding, valuing it at more than $11 billion, according to Bloomberg. The deal will double the company’s value to $5.6 billion in just four months.
Bloomberg reported that the Founders Fund is expected to engage in talks to invest along with returning backers Thrive Capital and Lux Capital, along with Lightspeed Venture Partners. The deal is still in its early stages and details are subject to change, the outlet said.
TechCrunch visited Physical Intelligence’s headquarters in January, where co-founder Sergey Levine briefly outlined the company’s ambitions. “Think of it like ChatGPT, but for robots.” At the time, the company had raised just over $1 billion and hired about 80 employees to build general-purpose AI models that could enable robots to perform tasks ranging from folding laundry to peeling vegetables.
Co-founder Lachy Groom told TechCrunch that the company has no commercialization timeline, an unusual stance that investors don’t seem to care about. “There’s really no limit to how much we can invest in our work,” Groom said. “There is always more computing available to solve problems.”
