Where does Fei-Fei Li work?

Fei-Fei Li is Co-founder & CEO at World Labs and Board of Directors at Twitter.

What does Fei-Fei Li invest in?

Fei-Fei Li invests in AI & Machine Learning, Healthtech, Robotics.

What check size does Fei-Fei Li write?

Fei-Fei Li typically writes checks of $100K – $5M.

What companies did Fei-Fei Li found?

Fei-Fei Li founded World Labs, Twitter.

Fei-Fei Li

Founder

Co-founder & CEO at World Labs · Board of Directors at Twitter

Palo Alto, CA

Writes $100K – $5M checks · typically $1.5M

FoundedWorld Labs Twitter

About

Fei-Fei Li created ImageNet, the dataset that ignited the deep-learning revolution, and now leads World Labs, the spatial-intelligence startup she co-founded in 2024 that raised a $1 billion round in February 2026 at a reported $5 billion valuation. Born in Beijing and raised in Chengdu, she immigrated to New Jersey at 15, helped run her parents' dry-cleaning shop through Princeton (BA Physics, 1999), and took a Caltech PhD in electrical engineering. She directed the Stanford AI Lab, served as Chief Scientist of AI/ML at Google Cloud, co-founded the Stanford Institute for Human-Centered AI and the nonprofit AI4ALL, sat on Twitter's board, and wrote the memoir The Worlds I See. TIME has twice named her to its TIME100 AI list; much of the field calls her the godmother of AI.

Invests in

AI & Machine LearningHealthtechRobotics

Beyond investing

Founded: Li co-founded AI4ALL, a national non-profit aimed at increasing inclusion and diversity in AI education. Li co-founded Stanford's Human-Centered AI Institute, where she serves as Co-Director. Li co-founded World Labs, where she serves as CEO. Created ImageNet (launched 2009), the labeled-image dataset and challenge widely credited with catalyzing the deep-learning revolution. Co-founded the nonprofit AI4ALL in 2017 to broaden who builds AI; serves as board chairperson.
Education: Studied at Princeton (B.A., physics, 1999) Studied at California Institute of Technology (Caltech) (Ph.D., electrical engineering, 2005) Studied at Harvey Mudd College (honorary doctorate)
Boards: Li is a co-founder and board member of the national non-profit AI4ALL, which aims to increase inclusion and diversity in AI education. Li is co-founder and chairperson of the national non-profit AI4ALL. Served on Twitter's board of directors from May 2020 until the board dissolved with Musk's October 2022 takeover.
Communities: Li is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR). Founding co-director of the Stanford Institute for Human-Centered AI, launched with John Etchemendy in March 2019.
Awards: Li is an elected Member of the National Academy of Engineering (NAE). Li is an elected Member of the National Academy of Medicine (NAM). Li is an elected Member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences (AAAS). Li is a Fellow of ACM. Li received the 2019 IEEE PAMI Longuet-Higgins Prize. Li received the 2019 National Geographic Society Further Award. Li received the 2017 Athena Award for Academic Leadership. Li received the IAPR 2016 J.K. Aggarwal Prize. Li received the 2016 IEEE PAMI Mark Everingham Award. Li received the 2016 nVidia Pioneer in AI Award. Li received the 2014 IBM Faculty Fellow Award. Li received the 2011 Alfred Sloan Faculty Award. Li received the 2012 Yahoo Labs FREP award. Li received the 2009 NSF CAREER award. Li received the 2006 Microsoft Research New Faculty Fellowship. Li was selected as a 2017 Women in Tech by ELLE Magazine. Li was named a 2017 Awesome Women Award recipient by Good Housekeeping. Li was named a Global Thinker of 2015 by Foreign Policy. Li was named one of the 'Great Immigrants: The Pride of America' in 2016 by the Carnegie Foundation. Named to the TIME100 AI list in 2023 and again in 2025.
Family: Born in Beijing and raised in Chengdu; immigrated with her parents to Parsippany, New Jersey in 1992 at age 15, speaking minimal English. Her parents ran a dry-cleaning shop, and through Princeton she went home most weekends to help run it.
More: Li invented ImageNet, the first large-scale training and benchmarking dataset in AI, which helped catalyze the onset of modern AI. Li has published more than 200 scientific articles in top-tier journals and conferences including Nature, PNAS, and the New England Journal of Medicine. Published the memoir The Worlds I See (2023), picked for Princeton's Pre-read and year-end lists from Obama and the Financial Times.

Mentioned above: the Caltech mafia →

From Fei-Fei's own website — common ground for a warm intro.

Co-founder & CEO at World Labs

Intro paths

→

In turn, Fei-Fei can intro founders to World Labs's investors below.

World Labs's investors · 19

Alpha Square GroupNew York Andreessen HorowitzMenlo Park · $500K – $50M checks · since 2026 Cisco InvestmentsSan Jose Fidelity InvestmentsBoston FoundersXSilicon Valley FoundersX VenturesSilicon Valley GreycroftNew York · $100K – $5M checks Khosla VenturesMenlo Park · $5K – $50M checks New Enterprise Associates (NEA)Menlo Park · $200K – $40M checks NVenturesSanta Clara NVIDIASanta Clara · since 2026 Play Time VenturesSan Francisco Radical VenturesToronto · $1M – $25M checks Salesforce VenturesSan Francisco · $5M – $50M checks Sherpalo VenturesMenlo Park Sound VenturesSanta Monica SV AngelSan Francisco The Venture Reality FundRedwood City · $100K – $500K checks Valkyrie Ventures Management, LlcPark City

Co-founders at World Labs

Justin JohnsonCo-founder

Christoph LassnerCo-founder

Ben MildenhallCo-founder

Board of Directors at Twitter

Intro paths

→

In turn, Fei-Fei can intro founders to Twitter's investors below.

Twitter's investors · 2

1789 CapitalPalm Beach · since 2025 Felicis VenturesSan Francisco · $500K – $15M checks

Experience

World LabsCofounder, CEOcurrent2024 — presentSan Francisco, California, United States
Stanford UniversitySequoia Professor of Computer Sciencecurrent2009 — presentStanford, CA
Stanford UniversityStanford AI Lab Director2014 — 2018Stanford, CA
Stanford Institute for Human-Centered Artificial Intelligence (HAI)Denning Family Co-Director, Senior Fellowcurrent2018 — present
MasterClassMasterClass Instructorcurrent2026 — present
AI4ALLCo-Foundercurrent2017 — present
TwitterMember, Board of Directors2020 — 2022
GoogleChief Scientist of AI/ML; Vice President2017 — 2018Mountain View, CA
Princeton UniversityAssistant Professor2006 — 2009Princeton, NJ
University of Illinois at Urbana-ChampaignAssistant Professor2005 — 2006Urbana-Champaign, IL

Education

CaltechDoctor of Philosophy - PhD, Electrical and Electronics Engineering2000 — 2005
Princeton UniversityBachelor of Arts - BA, Physics1995 — 1999

Podcasts & interviews

featuring Fei-Fei Li

Spatial Intelligence Is AI's Next Frontier

TIME · time.com

With spatial intelligence, AI will understand the real world

TED · ted.com

Fei-Fei Li on The Worlds I See

NPR · npr.org

How we're teaching computers to understand pictures

TED · ted.com

Network10

Naval RavikantScout

Co-founder of AngelList; angel investor

Guillermo RauchScout

Founder & CEO of Vercel

Adam D'AngeloScout

Angel

Andy PriceScout

Founder, General Partner at Artisanal Ventures

Shardul ShahScout

Investor at Index Ventures

John Doerr

Chairman of Kleiner Perkins

Brenton Fargnoli

Partner at AlleyCorp

Faraz Fatemi

Partner at Lightspeed Venture Partners

Ramin Niroumand

Founder and Managing Partner at Embedded Capital

Rob Toews

Partner at Radical Ventures

Investors connected to Fei-Fei in public investor directories — a warm-intro map.

Frequently asked questions

Where does Fei-Fei Li work?: Fei-Fei Li is Co-founder & CEO at World Labs and Board of Directors at Twitter.
What does Fei-Fei Li invest in?: Fei-Fei Li invests in AI & Machine Learning, Healthtech, Robotics.
What check size does Fei-Fei Li write?: Fei-Fei Li typically writes checks of $100K – $5M.
What companies did Fei-Fei Li found?: Fei-Fei Li founded World Labs, Twitter.