AI Fund
also invests · investor profileMountain View, US · Founded 2018 · 13 known investors
AI Fund is a venture studio led by AI pioneers, operators, founders, and investors that helps founders build and scale AI companies. It operates as an investment and company-building organization in the artificial intelligence space.
Founders & leadership
AI Fund was founded in 2018 by Andrew Ng.
Investors · 13
Also in the syndicate · 7
Company profile
researched Aug 2026AI Fund is the AI-focused venture studio founded by Andrew Ng, the Stanford adjunct professor, Google Brain co-founder, and former Baidu chief scientist who also co-founded Coursera, DeepLearning.AI, and Landing AI. After resigning from Baidu in March 2017, Ng launched several ventures in quick succession -- DeepLearning.AI (online education) and Landing AI (enterprise computer-vision/MLOps SaaS) -- before formally unveiling AI Fund in January 2018 with $175 million in committed capital to back and co-found new AI startups (VentureBeat, Jan 30, 2018; corroborated by Wikipedia's Andrew Ng article). Unlike a traditional VC that evaluates outside pitches, AI Fund operates as a venture studio / startup foundry: it originates ideas internally (or with corporate partners), then acts as a 'minor co-founder,' assembling founding teams (often through an Engineer-in-Residence program), validating markets, and providing operational, recruiting, and fundraising support, aiming to take a company from idea to a funded, staffed startup in as little as three months.
Funding history: AI Fund's first vehicle ('Fund I') closed at $175 million in January 2018, backed by limited partners including New Enterprise Associates (NEA), Sequoia Capital, and SoftBank Group (per AI Fund's own About page, which cites a very similar $176 million figure -- likely a rounding/reporting variance of the same raise). On May 5, 2025, AI Fund announced it had closed an oversubscribed second fund ('Fund II') of approximately $190 million, again anchored by Sequoia Capital and NEA but this time bringing in a roster of strategic corporate LPs: The AES Corporation, HP Inc., Mitsui & Co., Mitsubishi Corporation, QBE, and TELUS Global Ventures. As of AI Fund's own website (checked 2026), the firm describes itself as 'backed by over $370 million' in aggregate capital across its history, and names Sequoia Capital, NEA, Nikkei, and AES among its top-tier VC and corporate backers -- consistent with combining Fund I ($175M) and Fund II ($190M). The firm also operates or has operated a related 'AI Fund Growth Fund' vehicle (per team-page title 'Kirsty Tan, General Partner, AI Fund Growth Fund'), though no separate size/date could be confirmed for that vehicle from primary sources reviewed.
AI Fund has also built a network of named corporate co-building partnerships distinct from LP relationships: a strategic partnership with The AES Corporation (announced June 28, 2024) to co-build AI-for-energy startups; a partnership with Mitsubishi Corporation's Smart-Life Creation Group (announced Jan 27, 2025) targeting real estate and financial-services use cases; and the October 30, 2024 announcement of a new Taiwan/Asia hub led by General Manager Jill Shih. Separately, per Wikipedia (citing The Economic Times, Oct 8, 2024), AI Fund made its first investment in India in October 2024, backing AI healthcare startup Jivi.
Business model
Venture studio / startup foundry: AI Fund co-founds companies from scratch (idea validation, product build, recruiting, go-to-market) in exchange for founder-level equity, rather than operating as a traditional check-writing VC that responds to outside pitches; it also invests some capital from its funds directly into the ventures it co-builds.
Equity ownership stakes (as a minor co-founder) in the companies it builds and scales, realized through eventual exits (acquisition or IPO) of portfolio/studio companies; also manages committed capital from limited partners across successive funds (Fund I, Fund II, and an affiliated AI Fund Growth Fund).
▸Full profile — profile (continued), go-to-market, ownership
Profile (continued)
Team and leadership: Andrew Ng holds the title 'Managing General Partner' (functionally the CEO/head of the firm). The broader team (per aifund.ai/team as of 2026) includes Andy Ku (Partner), Eva Wang (Partner, COO & General Counsel), Ellen Li (CFO), Kirsty Tan (General Partner, AI Fund Growth Fund), Eli Chen (Technology Partner), Jill Shih (General Manager, Taiwan), Mike Rubino (Head of Talent), Nikki Angco (Chief of Staff to Andrew Ng), and a substantial bench of Venture Advisors and 'AI Fund Fellows' (e.g., Bill MacCartney, Laurence Moroney, Monte Zweben, Tim Westergren of Pandora, Warren Packard). AI Fund's headquarters is listed as 400 Castro Street, Suite 600, Mountain View, CA 94041 on its own contact page; Greylock's portfolio page instead lists AI Fund's HQ as Palo Alto, CA -- a minor address discrepancy across the two sources that could not be fully reconciled.
Portfolio: AI Fund's publicly listed portfolio (aifund.ai/portfolio, 2026) includes roughly 40 named companies plus several undisclosed 'stealth' companies across e-commerce, data, energy, infrastructure, field service, tax credits, and voice apps. Notable/named portfolio companies include: Landing AI (computer-vision/MLOps, Ng's own earlier venture, folded into the studio's portfolio listing), Workera (skills-verification platform, CEO Kian Katanforoosh), Workhelix (enterprise AI-productivity analytics, co-founded with economists Erik Brynjolfsson and Andrew McAfee, CEO James Milin, CTO Daniel Rock), Factored / Factored AI (AI engineering talent/services, CEO Israel Niezen -- this company notably expanded operations to Medellín, Colombia in 2019 per TechCrunch), IrisGo (AI-PC 'digital butler,' CEO Jeffrey Lai), Profitmind (retail AI profit engine, CEO Mark Chrystal), Bearing (maritime-shipping AI decision engine, CEO Dylan Keil), Credo AI (AI governance/risk/compliance platform founded 2020, CEO Navrina Singh), ResolveGrid (agentic field-service AI platform built on IP from Xerox's CareAR, CEO Jens Meggers), Vocal Bridge (voice infrastructure for AI agents, CEO Ashwyn Sharma), SpeechLab (speech-to-speech translation), WhyLabs and ValidMind (AI/ML observability and model-risk tooling), Baseten (AI model-serving infrastructure), and Meeno (relationship/mental-health coaching app associated with founder Dr. Alison Darcy, previously known for founding Woebot Health). AI Fund's own portfolio index page tags four companies -- Bearing, Credo AI, ResolveGrid, and Vocal Bridge -- with an 'Acquired' status label; however, each of those companies' individual detail pages on the same site still display a generic 'Status: Private' badge and, in ResolveGrid's case, recent 2025-2026 news coverage describing it as a newly launched company, so the acquisition status/acquirer for these four could not be independently confirmed and is flagged here as an unresolved discrepancy rather than asserted as fact.
Disambiguation note: There is an unrelated, similarly-named company, 'AI.FUND' (ai-fund.vc), a Hamburg, Germany-based early-stage venture capital fund founded by Ragnar Kruse, Petra Vorsteher, and others (former Smaato executives) investing in European AI startups. This is a completely different entity from Andrew Ng's AI Fund (aifund.ai) and should not be confused with it -- notably, Crunchbase's 'ai-fund' organization slug resolves to the Hamburg firm, not Ng's studio, and no working Crunchbase URL for Ng's AI Fund could be located during this research.
Go-to-market
Early-stage AI entrepreneurs and technical founders (including an 'Engineer in Residence' program) plus corporate and venture-fund partners (e.g., AES, Mitsubishi Corporation, Mitsui, HP, QBE, TELUS) seeking to co-build new AI-driven businesses in their industries.
Ownership
private
Compiled by commissioned research from 19 cited public sources — announcements, filings, and press listed under research sources below.
Key figures
latest reportedCompany-reported or press-reported figures, each dated to when it was claimed — not independently audited.
Founder mafia
The AI Fund mafia →7 people who came through AI Fund went on to found or lead other companies.
Competitors · 1
by search overlap
Companies competing with AI Fund for the same Google search keywords, organic and paid, via search-intersection analysis.
Timeline · 9
launches, deals, and filingsAI Fund announces the closing of its oversubscribed second fund, backed by AES, HP, Mitsui, Mitsubishi, QBE, TELUS, Sequoia Capital, and NEA.
Strategic partnership with Mitsubishi Corporation's Smart-Life Creation Group to co-build AI startups in real estate and financial services.
AI Fund announces a new Taiwan hub led by General Manager Jill Shih to expand its and its portfolio companies' presence in Asia.
AI Fund makes its first investment in India, backing AI healthcare startup Jivi.
Strategic partnership announced to co-build AI-driven energy-transition startups.
AI Fund-linked company Landing AI raises a $57 million Series A led by McRock Capital to help manufacturers adopt computer vision.
TechCrunch reports Andrew Ng's AI companies (including AI Fund portfolio operations) expanding to Medellín, Colombia.
Andrew Ng publicly unveils AI Fund, a $175 million venture studio fund to back and co-found new AI startups.
Ng announces his resignation as Chief Scientist of Baidu, shortly after which he launches DeepLearning.AI and Landing AI.
Dated company events from announcements, filings, and press; legal rows summarize public dockets and regulator releases.
In the news
▸Research sources · 19
primary sources listed
- AI Fund closes oversubscribed $190 million Fund II to co-found AI startupsAI Fund · company site
- AI Fund & Mitsubishi Corporation Join Forces to Drive AI InnovationAI Fund · company site
- AI Fund Announces Expansion into Taiwan with New Asian HubAI Fund · company site
- AI Fund & AES partner to co-build AI energy startupsAI Fund · company site
- Home - AI FundAI Fund · company site
- About - AI FundAI Fund · company site
- Team Members - AI FundAI Fund · company site
- Portfolio - AI FundAI Fund · company site
- Contact Us - AI FundAI Fund · company site
- Insights - AI FundAI Fund · company site
- Bearing - AI FundAI Fund · company site
- Credo AI - AI FundAI Fund · company site
19 public sources were cited for this profile; the first-party ones are listed here.
Frequently asked questions
- What does AI Fund do?
- Co-founding companies together from idea to impact.
- Who founded AI Fund?
- AI Fund was founded by Andrew Ng in 2018.
- Who are AI Fund's investors?
- AI Fund's investors include Sequoia Capital, Greylock Partners, M1720, New Enterprise Associates (NEA), Samsung Catalyst Fund, SoftBank Group.
- Where is AI Fund headquartered?
- AI Fund is headquartered in Mountain View, US.