AI inference startup Baseten reportedly raising $1.5B months after its last mega-round
AI inference company Baseten is near closing a $1.5 billion funding round at a $13 billion valuation, just five months after its $300 million Series E, according to The Wall Street Journal.
Stunning funding round
Baseten, a startup specializing in AI model inference, is reportedly finalizing a massive $1.5 billion funding round that would value it at $13 billion. This comes only five months after the company announced a $300 million Series E round at a $5 billion valuation, and nine months after a $150 million Series D round.
Split-priced deal
However, the WSJ notes that this is a split-priced round, a tactic startups use to boost their headline valuation and make lead investors look better on paper. Some investors in this round are participating at a $13 billion valuation, while others are at $11 billion, according to sources.
Investors and background
The round is co-led by Spark Capital, Sands Capital, Altimeter Capital, and Wellington Management. Founded in 2019, Baseten is riding the "inference gold rush," as termed by The Next Wave, with VCs pouring enormous amounts into companies building the inference layer. Inference refers to what a model does after a user submits a prompt. Baseten promises fast inference while controlling costs by routing requests to the best model for the task, notably cheaper open-source alternatives.
