Genesis Robotics, the AI and robotics company cofounded by ex-Mistral employee Theophile Gervet, has closed an $85m round just six months after launching, according to two sources familiar with the matter.
Sifted previously reported Gervet and cofounder Zhou Xian, who recently graduated with a PhD in robotics from Carnegie Mellon University in the US, were seeking funding for the company.
Research scientist Theophile Gervet quit his role at French AI darling Mistral in December, according to his Linkedin. Since then, he has been listed as the founder of a stealth AI and robotics startup.
The pair launched Paris-based Genesis AI towards the end of 2024, according to company creation documents seen by Sifted.
Sources say the round, which comprises both equity and debt, was co-led by Khosla Ventures, a US investor which has also backed OpenAI, DoorDash and Stripe.
US investor Eclipse Capital, which focuses on investments in physical industries, also led the round, sources say. The funding was raised in two tranches since the company launched at the end of 2024.
Sifted approached Gervet, Xian, Khosla Ventures and Eclipse Capital for comment.
What does Genesis Robotics do?
Genesis Robotics plans to create synthetic data to train AI models for robotics.
At the end of December, Xian posted about the “Genesis project” on social media platform X — an open source tool he said was created as part of a “research collaboration involving 20 other labs”.
The project is a platform to simulate realistic 3D worlds where objects move and interact, intended to train AI models to power robots. It was particularly noted because it can simulate physical worlds up to 430k times faster than in real life.
To make sure they can navigate the messiness of the real world, such as different lighting, surfaces, objects and obstacles, robots must be trained with huge amounts of data. This is why synthetic data, which can simulate real environments faster, has been pitched as an efficient way to train AI models for robotics.
Read the orginal article: https://sifted.eu/articles/exclusive-genesis-robotics-85m-round/
