Mozilla invests $30M to launch Mozilla.ai and redefine the next era of AI

Non-profit Mozilla Foundation commits funding to build startup dedicated to developing trustworthy AI apps and products.

  • Tuesday, 28th March 2023 Posted 1 year ago in by Phil Alsop

Mozilla has launched Mozilla.ai - a new startup and community that will build an open-source trustworthy AI.

 

Mozilla.ai’s mission is to make developing trustworthy AI apps and products easy and underscores Mozilla’s commitment to the future of technology and bettering the internet, while also setting the expectation of what is to follow in the future.

 

Mozilla will make an initial $30M investment in the company, via its non-profit Mozilla Foundation. The company will exist as a separate entity from the Mozilla Foundation and Mozilla Corp.

 

This new company will be led by Managing Director Moez Draief, who has spent over a decade working on the practical applications of cutting edge AI as an academic at Imperial College and LSE, and as a chief scientist in industry. Harvard’s Karim Lakhani, Credo’s Navrina Singh and Executive President of Mozilla, Mark Surman, will serve as the initial Board of Mozilla.ai.

 

The vision for Mozilla.ai is to make it easy to develop trustworthy AI products within an independent open-source AI ecosystem. Mozilla.ai will be a community outside big tech and academia for like-minded founders, developers, scientists, product managers and builders to gather - all with the aim of creating an independent, decentralised and trustworthy AI ecosystem.

 

Mark Surman comments: “It is already clear that one of the biggest stories of 2023 will be AI - reshaping not just how we think about the internet, but also communication, creativity, and society at large. This has generated excitement, but also significant apprehension. The coming wave of AI has tremendous potential to enrich people’s lives, but it will only do so by putting human agency and the interests of users at the core, and by prioritising transparency and accountability.”

 

Surman adds: “The AI inflection point that we’re in right now offers a real opportunity to build technology with different values, new incentives, and a better ownership model. Mozilla.ai aims to do exactly that.”