Jeff Bezos’ Prometheus raises $12B to accelerate industrial engineering projects

Prometheus Inc., an artificial intelligence startup co-led by Amazon.com Inc. founder Jeff Bezos, has raised $12 billion in funding.

Axios reported today that the Series B round values the company at $41 billion. The round included contributions from Bezos, JPMorgan, BlackRock, Goldman Sachs, DST Global and Arch Venture Partners. Prometheus, which was until now known as Project Prometheus, previously raised $6.1 billion.

Bezos launched the company last November with Vik Bajaj, a co-founder of Alphabet Inc.’s Verily life sciences unit. They lead Prometheus as co-chief executive officers. The duo told CNBC today that Prometheus is developing a set of AI tools designed to speed up hardware development. In a separate interview with Axios, Bezos stated that he expects the software to accelerate engineering workflows by a factor of 10 or more.

Prometheus is prioritizing a broad range of use cases. Its software will reportedly be capable of designing robots, jet engines and drugs. Bezos told Axios the technology could also help cloud operators improve their data centers. That hints Prometheus’ tools will be capable of automating chip development tasks.

The company plans to focus on the prototyping and pre-production manufacturing phases of engineering projects. Prometheus hasn’t yet disclosed how it plans to go about speeding up those tasks.

Several of the existing AI engineering tools on the market speed up prototyping by enabling users to quickly generate multiple versions of a product design. Some startups, such as PhysicsX Ltd., are also automating the simulation phase of prototyping initiatives. Engineers test AI-generated product design variations in a simulation to determine which one provides the best performance.

Simulations replicate the real world using partial differential equations, functions that lend themselves well to describing physical phenomena. Such functions require a significant amount of hardware to run. AI engineering tools speed up calculations using algorithms called neural operators that are specifically optimized to solve equations.

Pre-production manufacturing, Prometheus’ other focus area, is the low-volume production of prototype designs. It’s often carried out using 3D printers. Axios reported that Prometheus’ software will be capable of optimizing pre-production manufacturing equipment.

The company faces competition from not only fellow startups such as PhysicsX but also more established players. Autodesk Inc., Synopsys Inc. and Cadence Design Systems Inc. have all integrated AI features into their engineering applications. The companies’ automation tools automate not only prototyping workflows but also other tasks such as checking whether a component design complies with relevant regulations.

Prometheus will reportedly use most of its $12 billion funding round to buy computing infrastructure. The company may also make more acquisitions. Last year, Prometheus bought a startup called General Agents Inc. that developed an AI agent optimized for multistep computer use tasks.

Photo: Unsplash

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