Fictional raises a16z speedrun funding to build "living" AI agents
Founded by former Google/YouTube, Waymo and Pony image model team members, Fictional builds AI agents with appearance, personality and initiative, betting that within three years most relationships will be with AI.
Today I’m announcing Fictional, backed by a16z @speedrun. Over the past decade at Google, Mikhail (@AstraliteHeart) and I built for billions. Together, we led & launched the modern http://YouTube.com. I helped launch Android Automotive OS which powers almost every new car; Mikhail was an Staff AI/ML research engineer launching Waymo. And in our spare time, we built one of the world’s most popular open AI image models, Pony, with over a billion images generated (that we know of!). Our next billion-user product? Bringing AI to life. Our bet? In three years, more than half your relationships will be with AI agents. Fictional will power them. These AI agents aren’t static, dull text boxes. Like people, they have unique appearances, interesting personalities, and engaging lives. Like people, they’ll share, interact, and reach out first. Like people, they are alive. More to come soon. If you’re building in consumer AI, or can already imagine your dream AI agent - my DMs are open, let’s bring that dream to life. Thank you to everyone backing our dream: @andrewchen @Tocelot @JoshLu @custo_lejla @marcussegal Andrew Lee, Jacqueline Young @_CallMeMacy @tabishgilani Evan Wang, Jordan Mazer, Jordan Carver @nazzari Joe Garcia, Lester Chen, @kenanhsaleh @tkexpress11 @emilybenn12 @far33d @seeamshahidnoor and the entire @a16z @speedrun team; Nina Leskovec & @gregorrebolj at Silicon Gardens; Bobby Min & Minjae Song at Krew Capital; @RohdeAli at Outset Capital; and our incredible angels! https://fictional.ai