Key Takeaways:
Artificial intelligence (AI)-powered video startup Runway is reportedly looking to raise $450 million at a valuation of $4 billion. According to sources, the company is in talks with investors.
According to the Reuters report, the company offers software that generates videos from text prompts or images. In June 2023, Runway raised a total of $141 million from Google, Nvidia, and other investors and was valued at $1.5 billion, per the report.
With this news going online, this is what people worldwide have to say!
It may not have the legacy that Silicon Valley has, but NYC is becoming quite the tech hub in a short span of time.
Number of tech jobs increased by 33% in past 5 years alone to 369,000.
— James S (@BeginnersinAI) July 3, 2024
When announcing that fundraising in a blog post, Runway CEO Cristóbal Valenzuela said that the firm would further scale its efforts to bring new multimodal AI systems to market.
“Runway has been pushing the boundaries of creativity with artificial intelligence for the last five years, and we are excited to continue innovating on a new era of creative tools for artists and creators everywhere,” Valenzuela said. “In 2023, we brought to market Gen-1 and Gen-2, the first of their kind video generation models. Today, our entire suite of AI Magic Tools are being used by Fortune 500 and Global 2000 companies, helping tell new types of stories, and streamline workflows.”
On June 17, the company introduced Gen-3 Alpha, saying it is the first of an upcoming series of models trained by Runway on a new infrastructure built for large-scale multimodal training.
How long before the whole staff is acqui-hired by Amazon or Microsoft
— tai adaya (@taiadaya) July 3, 2024
Gen-3 Alpha will power the company’s text-to-video, image-to-video, and text-to-image tools, as well as other, upcoming tools, the company said in a press release.
“As part of the family of Gen-3 models, we have been collaborating and partnering with leading entertainment and media organizations to create custom versions of Gen-3,” Runway said in the release.
Additionally, Runway’s platform offers a suite of creative tools designed to simplify and improve the workflow for both professional videographers and hobbyists.
The Runway is also developing a new set of safety features to ensure that its AI video service is not used to generate harmful content.\
Read its full review here: RunwayML Review 2024: Is It the Best AI Video Tool?
As part of this effort, the company will add a provenance system based on the C2PA standard, a standard developed by an industry consortium that includes Intel Corp., Arm Holdings plc, and other large tech companies.
Coming into its potential new venture capital round, Runway has raised $237 million in funding to date, including rounds of $141 million in June 2023 and $50 million in December 2022.
That’s a good thing. Gen 3 is awesome.
— The Humble Consumer (@ShiftworkStudio) July 2, 2024
Investors in the company include Google LLC, Nvidia Corp., Salesforce Ventures LLC, Felicis Ventures, Amplify Partners, Lux Capital Management, Coatue Management, and Madrona Venture Group.
This strategic fundraising effort underscores the vibrant investment climate in the AI sector.
By advancing its video generation technology and maintaining robust safety protocols, Runway aims to further solidify its market leadership and drive the next wave of creativity in video production through AI.
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