Photo/Illutration The red fish in Sakana AI’s logo reflects the company’s aim to be unique in the field. (Provided by Sakana AI)

Sakana AI, a rising startup in Tokyo run by prominent figures in the generative artificial intelligence field, is gaining support from corporate giants in and outside Japan.

The company announced on Sept. 17 that it has received investments from 10 Japanese companies, including Dai-ichi Life Insurance Co., Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group Inc. (MUFG) and two other megabanks.

Sakana AI had earlier raised funds in August from U.S. semiconductor giant Nvidia Corp. and a U.S. venture capital that has invested in OpenAI in the United States.

Sakana AI has become a “unicorn,” an unlisted startup with a value exceeding $1 billion (142 billion yen), within a year or so of its foundation.

MUFG President Hironori Kamezawa expressed high expectations for Sakana AI and underscored the growing use of AI and digital data in the financial industry.

“We hope MUFG’s AI strategies will become increasingly advanced through the utilization of the sophisticated technology and innovative model development method” of Sakana AI, Kamezawa said in a statement.

Japanese companies’ total investment in Sakana AI is estimated at around 10 billion yen. The new investors include NEC Corp., Fujitsu Ltd., KDDI Corp. and Itochu Group.

The latest round of fund raising puts Sakana AI’s total at 30 billion yen.

Sakana AI has attracted attention largely because of its personnel and developmental method.

The three people who established Sakana AI in Tokyo in July 2023 are known forerunners in AI model creation.

CEO David Ha once headed the research division of Stability AI in Britain, which is famed for its AI image generator.

Sakana AI’s chief technical officer, Llion Jones, came from Google and co-authored a globally noted AI-themed paper released by the U.S. company in 2017.

The chief operating officer of Sakana AI, Ren Ito, is a former Japanese Foreign Ministry official who was also an executive officer at e-commerce marketplace operator Mercari Inc. and chief operating officer of Stability AI.

Sakana AI’s development style is reflected in its logo featuring fish, or “sakana” in Japanese. A single red fish representing the company branches away from its black counterparts heading in the same direction.

In AI development, it is common to design AI models from scratch by taking full advantage of large-scale facilities and a huge volume of data. With their financial strength, Google and OpenAI can gain an edge in the field in this regard.

Sakana AI has created the “evolutionary model merge” method, which combines conventional models into high-performance models at more affordable prices.

Under the framework, AI automatically tests a range of model combinations over generations to identify new excellent models. It works like the evolution process in nature.

In August, Sakana AI introduced the AI Scientist using the “evolutionary” computation technique.

The AI Scientist consists of multiple AI models, each playing distinct roles to autonomously work out academic papers. All processes, from idea development to experimentation, writing and peer review, can be finished automatically.

This accomplishment was presented on the website of British scientific journal Nature.

Leveraging its technical capabilities, Sakana AI intends to release and commercialize AI services tailored to the specific needs of individual companies.

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