AI researcher François Chollet founds a new AI lab focused on AGI

François Chollet, an influential AI researcher, is launching a new startup that aims to create frontier AI systems with innovative designs.

startup, wellAn AI research and science lab will be formed. It is looking for “development and implementation”. AGI. AGI, which stands for “artificial general intelligence,” generally refers to AI that can perform any task a human can perform. This is one goal post For many AI companies, including OpenAI.

“We’re betting on a different path to creating AI capable of true innovation, adaptation and innovation,” Cholet wrote. Series of posts on X. “We believe we have a small but real chance to achieve a breakthrough – to create AI that can learn at least as efficiently as humans and that can improve over time without interruption.”

NDEA plans to use a technique called program synthesis in conjunction with other technological approaches to unlock AGI. Chollet thinks that program synthesis, which allows AI to generalize from just a few examples to previously unseen problems, can help overcome some of the most complex problems in AI research.

Program synthesis is traditionally computing-intensive. But Cholet thinks this limitation can be overcome — and overcoming it will help accelerate scientific progress.

“[W]E is not alone in recognizing the potential of program synthesis – it is a technique that every frontier AI lab is now beginning to explore,” reads a blog post on Ndea’s website. “We are on the cusp of a pivotal moment in scientific history and the world deserves every direct, unique effort possible to build AGI.”

Ndea, which Chollet co-founded with Zapier co-founder and head of AI Mike Knoop, did not disclose whether it had raised any capital from outside investors. But the company is currently hiring for remote research positions, suggesting there is at least some financial backing.

It’s not everyday that you see people of this caliber @fchollet And @MikeKnoop Decided to start a company! I’m excited to be involved as a supporter, but importantly, their vision for how to solve hard problems in AI is fantastic. Our field is dominated by hype and hope -… https://t.co/7u6OT1vrHc

— Naveen Rao (@NaveenGRao) January 15, 2025

Knoop said he is stepping away from his day-to-day work at Zapier to focus on Ndia, but will remain a member of Zapier’s board.

“We’re putting together the world’s top program synthesis team,” Knoop said In a post by X. “Our first focus is on synthesizing deep learning-directed programs to create AGI that can innovate, adapt, and innovate … but even more exciting is the opportunity to metaphorically time travel into the future: learn, innovate, and discover things decades or even decades away. won’t occur organically for centuries.”

Cholet, who recently on A nonprofit with Knoop to develop standards for AGI, the latest high-profile AI researcher to leave Big Tech to found an independent AI lab. Perhaps best known as the creator of Keras, a high-level, open-source API that can be used to build AI models and tackle machine learning tasks, Chollet announcement He left Google last November after nearly a decade there.

Ilya Sutskever, former chief scientist and co-founder of OpenAI, Established last year Safe Super Intelligence, an AI lab that has raised $1 billion in capital from investors including Sequoia and Andreessen Horowitz. Elsewhere, longtime Google AI researcher and Stanford academic Fei-Fei Li is moving forward World LabsA company is developing AI systems that can create 3D simulations similar to video games.

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