Mira Murati's Thinking Machines Lab Secures $2 Billion Seed Round Valuation $10 Billion

Thinking Machines Lab, a new AI company founded by Mira Murati, has successfully closed a $2 billion seed round, pushing its valuation to $10 billion. The company, based in San Francisco, has been in operation for only six months and has yet to share any details about its products or roadmap. The round was led by Andreessen Horowitz, with backing from Sarah Guo through her firm Conviction Partners. Despite the lack of a business model, demo, or forecast, Mira Murati's reputation was enough to secure the investment.

Thinking Machines has hired a team of former OpenAI employees, including John Schulman, Jonathan Lachman, Barret Zoph, and Lilian Weng. These individuals worked with Mira at OpenAI before she left in September 2023. At OpenAI, Mira led work on ChatGPT, the Dall-E image tool, and newer voice features. She was also involved in the leadership crisis at OpenAI, questioning CEO Sam Altman's leadership before the failed board coup in November. After the new round, Mira holds voting power on the board that beats every other director combined, giving her full control over all major decisions.

Despite the lack of a product, pitch deck, or actual tech revealed, Mira raised billions. She didn't even pretend to share financials. One investor told that she didn’t explain the company’s financial plan or business structure during the pitch. Another one who passed said the whole thing was “too secretive.” Somebody who was pitched said Thinking Machines is probably trying to build artificial general intelligence, the theoretical concept where machines can think and reason like humans, or better. But they also admitted the team is still in the strategy phase, meaning they’re not actually building it yet — they’re still figuring out how.

One investor who went in anyway said, “There’s a real finite group of founders, and incredibly smart people. The team [Murati has] pulled together is compelling.” It’s the kind of vague confidence that only exists in a place where $2 billion can be handed out without a product. The startup did post something online back in February, saying it wanted to make AI “more widely understood, customizable, and generally capable.” That’s the only public statement they’ve made. No site updates since. No launch. Nothing in testing.

Mira’s not the only one getting funded without showing anything. Ilya Sutskever, another OpenAI co-founder, raised $2 billion in April for a company called Safe Superintelligence, with a $32 billion valuation. Just like Thinking Machines, Sutskever’s startup didn’t have a product either. But unlike Mira, he didn’t get voting rights that let him overrule every single person on the board. So far, Thinking Machines Lab hasn’t said when it will release anything or what its first project will be. The only thing it has shown the public is Mira’s name, her team of ex-OpenAI talent, and now, a $2 billion runway to figure the rest out. Investors who didn’t join said they needed more details. But the ones who backed it clearly didn’t care.