Since the launch of OpenAI’s ChatGPT in 2022, the tech scene has been bustling with each company geared up to create their versions of generative AI. Industry titans, including Google, Alibaba, and Meta are actively striving to develop their equivalents to ChatGPT. Startups like Anthropic, with investments from Google, and Stability AI are also making noteworthy advancements in this domain.
Joining these companies, a group of tech experts from Google has joined hands for a new startup dubbed /dev/agents. This new company specialises in launching a cloud operating system for AI agents.
Raises $56M funding
Recently, this startup based in San Francisco has raised $56 million led by Index Ventures and Alphabet’s investment fund CapitalG (which recently backed Lighthouse and Odoo). The round also saw participation from angel investors, including Scale AI CEO Alexander Wang, Palo Alto Networks CEO Nikesh Arora, and OpenAI co-founder Andrej Karpathy. According to Bloomberg, the fundraising round values /dev/agents at $500 million.
This investment will help the company have the first version of its product available in the first half of next year.
The team behind /dev/agents
The startup was founded in 2022 by David Singleton, the former CTO at fintech firm Stripe who previously worked with Google’s Android Wear and Google Fit teams; Hugo Barra, who was previously Vice President of Product Management for Android at Google, Vice President of Oculus at Meta and the Head of International for Xiaomi; Ficus Kirkpatrick, who worked on Android as an early engineer and was later appointed Vice President of Augmented and Virtual Reality at Meta; and Nicholas Jitkoff, the former lead designer of the Google Chrome OS and head at Dropbox.
Next-gen operating system for AI agents
Modern AI will change how people use software in their daily lives. Agentic applications could, for the first time, enable computers to work with people in much the same way people work with people. But it won’t happen without removing a ton of blockers. We need new UI patterns, a reimagined privacy model, and a developer platform that makes it radically simpler to build useful agents. That’s the challenge /dev/agents wants to resolve.
The platform includes reimagined user interfaces tailored specifically for AI interactions, a robust privacy model designed to ensure trust and security for users, and a simplified developer platform that enables creators to build valuable and intuitive AI agents with ease.
/dev/agents’ vision aligns with growing calls for ethical and transparent AI development. By prioritising privacy and simplicity, it could set a benchmark for future AI innovations. With the support from a leadership that has experience at Google, the startup could play a key role in shaping the future of AI.
Makes AI accessible to all
The /dev/agents platform makes it easier to build AI agents in a new cloud-based operating system. It will work seamlessly across all devices, making AI more accessible and functional. If AI agents become as widespread as mobile apps, a joint technical structure will be necessary to connect these agents and allow them to interact with each other. Imagine this is similar to how apps work in operating systems such as iOS and Android.
The future operating system for AI agents will work on devices such as phones, laptops, and even cars. The startup also wants to create a new user interface so that people can interact with agents on various hardware devices more naturally.
In a blog post, Nina Achadjian, a partner at Index Ventures said: “At Index, we believe it’s all about the people. This is an extraordinary team with a unique combination of engineering brilliance, design expertise, and operational excellence honed during their years working together on Android. They are exactly the right people to go after building an operating system for AI Agents. Their vision of an agentic future promises to transform how we interact with software in our daily lives. Instead of navigating an app grid for every task, agentic applications could bring solutions directly to users, working collaboratively and intelligently, much like people do.”
The partners at CapitalG Lin Zhu, Manmeet Gujral, and Jill (Greenberg) Chase said “We are excited to announce that CapitalG is co-leading a $56M Seed round in /dev/agents, a new company building an operating system for AI agents. It’s an ambitious vision from an equally ambitious team whose trailblazing work on pivotal platforms like Android makes them uniquely qualified to unlock the power of AI agents for all developers. We are thrilled to partner with David Singleton, Hugo Barra, Ficus Kirkpatrick, and Nicholas Jitkoff on day one of their journey – and beyond.”
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