New architectures & efficiency · Tokyo, JP · founded 2023
Sakana AI: who founded it, who funds it
Sakana AI is a Tokyo AI architecture lab founded in 2023 by David Ha, Llion Jones and Ren Ito, who came from DeepMind and Mercari. What it is building: nature-inspired methods: evolutionary model merging and sample efficiency; Japan's most valuable AI startup, with an RSI lab since June 2026. It has raised $379M in disclosed rounds, most recently a Series B of $135M at a $2.65B valuation in November 2025. It has a product on the market.
- Founders
- David Ha (ex-Google DeepMind), Llion Jones (ex-Google DeepMind), Ren Ito (ex-Mercari)
- Founders from
- ex-Google DeepMind, ex-Mercari
- Location
- Tokyo, JP (Asia)
- Valuation
- $2.65B set by the last priced round
- Raised
- $379M disclosed
- Investors
- Lux Capital lead, Khosla Ventures lead, NEA lead, Nvidia, Google
- What ships
- Product
Rounds
| Date | Round | Amount | Valuation | Lead | Source |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Nov 17, 2025 | Series B | $135M | $2.65B | · | techcrunch.com |
| Sep 4, 2024 | Series A | $214M | $1.5B | NEA, Lux Capital, Khosla Ventures | clay.com |
| Jan 16, 2024 | Seed | $30M | · | Lux Capital, Khosla Ventures | sakana.ai |
Sources
- Google invests winbuzzer.com
News
-
Oct 2, 2026
- Jul 16, 2026
- Jun 5, 2026
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Jan 23, 2026
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Nov 17, 2025
Investors who back other labs here
- Nvidia also: Safe Superintelligence, Reflection AI, Skild AI, Poolside
- Khosla Ventures also: General Intuition, Genesis AI, Symbolica, Veeda AI
- Lux Capital also: Cognition, Physical Intelligence, Applied Compute, EvolutionaryScale
- Google also: Safe Superintelligence, Ineffable Intelligence, Essential AI, Isomorphic Labs
- NEA also: World Labs, CuspAI
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