Advanced Machine Intelligence (AMI), the artificial intelligence startup founded by former Meta chief AI scientist Yann LeCun, has raised $1.03 billion in one of the largest seed funding rounds ever recorded for a European technology company.
The company said the financing values AMI at $3.5 billion before the new capital. The round was co-led by Cathay Innovation, Greycroft, Hiro Capital, HV Capital, and Bezos Expeditions.
AMI aims to develop a different approach to artificial intelligence from the large language models that currently dominate the sector. Instead of systems focused on predicting the next word or image element, the company is building what it describes as “world models” designed to reason, plan, and interact with real-world environments.
LeCun, who joined Facebook in 2013 to establish the company’s AI research unit and left Meta in late 2025, has long argued that language-based systems alone cannot deliver broadly capable intelligence.
“Current AI approaches based on predicting the next word or pixel will not produce broadly capable intelligent agents by themselves,” he told Reuters.
The company is targeting enterprise customers operating in complex physical systems, including manufacturers, automakers, aerospace groups, and pharmaceutical companies. These sectors typically require AI systems that can model processes over time, maintain persistent memory, and operate within strict safety constraints.
AMI says its technology is designed to understand how environments evolve and to support decision-making in areas such as industrial automation, robotics, and healthcare.
Wired reported that potential applications include modelling equipment such as aircraft engines, enabling manufacturers to optimise efficiency, reduce emissions, and improve maintenance planning.
The startup is headquartered in Paris and also operates offices in New York, Montreal, and Singapore. Its founding leadership team includes chief executive Alexandre LeBrun, previously co-founder of medical AI company Nabla, and chief science officer Saining Xie.
The scale of the investment reflects continued investor appetite for new AI architectures beyond large language models. Venture capital has increasingly begun backing research groups focused on systems that interact with the physical world, including robotics and spatial intelligence.
Despite leaving Meta, LeCun said discussions are already under way about potential collaboration with the technology group. One possible application under consideration is the use of AMI systems in Ray-Ban Meta smart glasses.
The financing arrives amid an unprecedented surge in global AI spending. Major technology companies are expected to invest hundreds of billions of dollars in artificial intelligence infrastructure and research over the coming years as competition intensifies across both consumer and enterprise applications.
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