Final December, OpenAI introduced it was opening purposes for its second cohort of a six-week accelerator program it had kicked off in 2022. Then issues grew very quiet. However OpenAI’s Converge 2 startup accelerator program did certainly happen, in line with two sources conversant in this system. TechCrunch additionally confirmed that the Open AI Startup Fund has funded startups within the cohort.
Converge 2, as that second accelerator program was referred to as, has been an odd exception to what’s usually a secular little bit of PR within the tech trade. Usually an accelerator program declares the startups accepted into, or graduated from, its packages. In spite of everything, as soon as it invests, it has each purpose to spice up these startups’ probabilities for achievement with its public stamp of approval.
However for months, a tech discussion board ran wild, asking if Converge 2 accelerator program really occurred. No one on that discussion board, which included individuals who stated they utilized, heard something. Nobody on the discussion board posted about getting in and even receiving rejection notices. And others within the Valley weren’t listening to about this system both, regardless of how excessive profile OpenAI is, numerous sources instructed TechCrunch.
This silence was odd as a result of it was not how the primary program labored. OpenAI held Converge I within the typical accelerator vogue in early 2023. It referred to as for purposes after which publicly introduced its first 4 investments from the general OpenAI Startup Fund. In December 2023, Open AI Startup Fund introduced it could begin accepting purposes for the second cohort of its accelerator program, Converge 2, anticipated to start in March 2024 and conclude by April.
However then, silence. There was no press launch from OpenAI in regards to the firms that earned investments. And after a number of requests for remark over months, OpenAI refused to even verify that this system passed off. Founders took to pondering on-line — and messaging us — about it.
We nonetheless can not get these near this system to inform us why OpenAI received’t publicly announce the cohort grads. Are the NDAs draconian? Is it only a don’t-talk tradition factor? Admittedly, even Converge 1 saved its communications low-key, and the businesses that had been stated to have partaken in it, like Cursor.AI, had been revealed slowly.
Definitely, between early 2023 and at the moment, the entire world is paying a lot nearer consideration to OpenAI, particularly as the corporate reportedly seeks to lift one other spherical that may worth it at $100 billion, in line with the WSJ. In truth, between Converge 1 and a pair of, the fund eliminated Sam Altman as its proprietor, changing him with one other VC, Ian Hathaway.
This transfer hasn’t impeded fund exercise. Since January, the fund has reduce checks into a number of new firms, in line with PitchBook, like AI chatbot Heeyo, wellness firm Thrive AI Well being, AI chatbot New Laptop, and Atmosphere Healthcare, which created an AI assistant for healthcare organizations. At the least two of those firms, a supply tells us, participated in a Converge program, although the particular person wouldn’t verify which of them, citing not eager to incur OpenAI’s displeasure.
As to what occurs inside this system, particulars are much more scarce. One particular person instructed us the principle profit is entry to OpenAI’s researchers and to unreleased mannequin know-how. That type of entry would lend itself to the idea that these firms are locked into some brawny NDAs, a device that OpenAI is keen on utilizing on its staff, as Vox not too long ago reported.