Ilya Sutskever, co-founder of OpenAI, has launched a new AI company focused on developing safe superintelligence. The venture has attracted significant attention from investors and researchers who believe that AI safety should be the primary focus of advanced AI development.
The new company, called Safe Superintelligence Inc. (SSI), has reportedly raised over billion in funding despite having no commercial products. Sutskever’s departure from OpenAI and his emphasis on safety over rapid deployment has been seen as a rebuke of the current AI arms race.
Industry observers are divided on whether SSI’s safety-first approach can compete with the breakneck pace of development at OpenAI, Google, and Anthropic. However, Sutskever’s track record as one of the pioneers of deep learning gives the venture significant credibility.