Baseten reportedly nearing $1.5B funding round at $13B valuation

In short: Baseten, a company that helps other businesses run AI models, is reportedly close to raising $1.5 billion at a $13 billion valuation.

What happened

Baseten, founded in 2019, is close to finalizing a new $1.5 billion funding round, according to The Wall Street Journal, as reported by TechCrunch. The deal would value the company at about $13 billion.

This comes soon after two other big rounds. Baseten announced a $300 million Series E round five months ago at a $5 billion valuation. That was just nine months after it raised $150 million in a Series D round.

The Wall Street Journal said this new round is “split-priced,” meaning different investors may be paying different prices for shares. Some investors are reportedly investing at a $13 billion valuation, while others are investing at $11 billion. The round is said to be co-led by Spark Capital, Sands Capital, Altimeter Capital, and Wellington Management.

Baseten focuses on “AI inference,” which is what happens after you type a question into an AI tool and the tool generates an answer (like the cooking part after you place an order). Baseten says it can do this quickly and at lower cost by sending each request to the best model for the job, including lower-cost open source models.

Why it matters

For regular people, this is mostly about cost and speed. If it becomes cheaper for companies to run AI, you may see more AI features added to everyday apps and services, and fewer delays when you use them. The huge investment also shows that investors think the business of running AI, not just building it, is becoming a major market.

Source: TechCrunch AI