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Why a $4.5B AI unicorn just got funding from Salesforce, Nvidia, and Ashton Kutcher

Brad Smith
·Host
Updated ·2-min read

Generative AI is shifting tectonic plates in the technology industry, prompting a tsunami of investment into the private sector and product development.

Salesforce (CRM), Nvidia (NVDA), Microsoft (MSFT), the Ashton Kutcher-founded Sound Ventures, and various other investors are driving the latest capital infusion in a $235 million series D funding round for Hugging Face — the open-source AI technology unicorn now valued at $4.5 billion. (And yes, it is named after an emoji.)

"We're super excited about this round," Hugging Face CEO Clément Delangue told Yahoo Finance Live (video above). "It’s kind of like a great validation for Hugging Face, but also for open source AI as a whole. We're going to use this money to really double down on the team — hire more great people — and really double down on our investments in open-source AI and collaboration features of our platform."

Hugging Face currently touts 500,000 language learning models, 250,000 datasets, and 50,000 organizations on the platform.

Hugging Face raised $235 million in a Series D funding at a $4.5 billion valuation. (Photo: Hugging Face)
Hugging Face raised $235 million in series D funding at a $4.5 billion valuation. (Photo: Hugging Face)

While currently still private, Delangue said he is keen on listing the company's public equity on the Nasdaq when time comes, especially since selling the growth story to investors could prove easier once margins are proven to be sustainable.

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Semiconductor companies led generative AI-related equity market price action early, and now datasets are gaining traction as generative AI prompts every business to consider where it can increase productivity and create profit producing customer connections.

An extremely significant stamp of approval, both large-cap and mega-cap companies who have benefitted the most from early AI demand are participants in this round of funding for Hugging Face.

"I think we’ve validated last year that there was massive usage for generative AI," Delangue said. "This year, we’re validating that there’s massive revenue for generative AI — with Nvidia, with the announcement of Hugging Face and others — and hopefully next year, we are going to validate that there’s margins for generative AI too. So it’s a very exciting kind of maturing cycle for generative AI."

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