Meta may be latest to join Big Tech kingmakers for AI startups

(Bloomberg/Isabella Ward and Natalie Lung) — Behind almost every leading artificial intelligence startup, you’ll find a tech giant fueling its rise.

Microsoft Corp., Alphabet Inc. and Amazon.com Inc. have invested billions in the top artificial intelligence startups, supercharging the fast-growing AI sector and establishing the old guard of technology companies as kingmakers for a new generation of businesses. Meta Platforms Inc. is set to join the fray: The social-media giant is in talks to make a multibillion-dollar investment into artificial intelligence startup Scale AI, Bloomberg News reported over the weekend.

The deals have attracted their fair share of scrutiny. Governments including the US, the UK and the European Union have reviewed some of these investments and partnerships, with some companies receiving requests about how such arrangements may affect the competitive landscape for AI development.

Microsoft is arguably the company that touched off the race among tech giants to partner with leading AI startups, paving the way with its $13 billion bet on OpenAI. Salesforce Inc. led a round in Hugging Face at a $4.5 billion valuation. Alphabet and Amazon.com have invested billions in OpenAI rival Anthropic. And Nvidia Corp. seemed to back almost every AI startup of note.

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For AI companies, these deals with Big Tech can serve as a vital lifeline. It’s extremely costly and computationally intensive to build large language models, the technology that underpins AI chatbots like ChatGPT. The tech giants are among the only companies with the infrastructure and funds to support these efforts.

–With assistance from Leah Nylen.

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