Hark raises $700M to build a personal AI assistant and devices

In short: Hark says it raised $700 million to build a personal AI assistant, and investors now value the company at $6 billion.

What happened

Hark, a new AI startup, announced a $700 million Series A funding round. A “Series A” is an early major funding round for a startup, where investors put in money to help it build and hire.

The round was led by Parkway Venture Capital. Other backers include AMD Ventures, Intel Capital, Qualcomm Ventures, Salesforce Ventures, ARK Invest, and several more.

Hark is led by CEO Brett Adcock, who has also been involved with robotics company Figure.AI and electric aircraft company Archer. TechCrunch reports that Hark has shared few details about what it is building, beyond saying it wants to create a “universal” AI interface, meaning one assistant that can work across many apps and services (like a single remote control for lots of devices).

Hark says it plans to release its first “multi-modal” AI models this summer. Multi-modal means the system can handle different types of information, like text, images, and possibly audio, not just written chat. The company also expects to later release its own hardware devices designed for this assistant.

Hark says it will use the money to hire for hardware, product design, and AI research, and to pay for “compute,” which is the expensive computer power needed to train and run AI models (like renting a lot of horsepower). The company has about 70 employees and runs its own data center using Nvidia B200 chips.

Why it matters

Big funding rounds like this can speed up new consumer AI products, but Hark is still keeping key details quiet. Privacy is a major open question for any assistant that might need lots of personal context to be useful, especially if it uses cameras or wearables.

Source: TechCrunch AI