(Bloomberg) -- H, a French artificial intelligence startup backed by a bevy of billionaires and venture capital firms, has lost three of its five co-founders before even releasing a product.
The startup cited “operational differences” as the reason for the departures in a post on LinkedIn.
The company formed earlier this year in Paris with the ambitious goal of developing autonomous agents — systems which can perform a range of tasks —that the startup said would outperform existing AI models. That pitch drew considerable investor interest, in large part due to the startup recruiting four seasoned scientists from Google DeepMind, Alphabet Inc.’s AI lab.
In May, Accel Partners LP lead an unusually large initial financing round for H, totaling $220 million. Other investors included Amazon.com Inc., Samsung and several billionaires such as former Google chief executive officer Eric Schmidt and LVMH CEO Bernard Arnault, via his fund.
Three months later, three of the H co-founders who joined from DeepMind have left: Karl Tuyls, Daan Wierstra and Julien Perolat. CEO Charles Kantor, a former Stanford University mathematics student, and chief technology officer Laurent Sifre, the fourth DeepMind veteran, remain.
The Information reported earlier on the departures, with Tulys telling the publication the split involved “business disagreements.” Tuyls didn’t respond to a request for comment.
Accel’s investment in H marked the venture firm’s first major deal with a startup building AI models, a sector that many of Accel’s rivals had already poured money into.
After the departures, H’s roadmap and vision “remained unchanged,” Philippe Botteri, a partner at Accel, said in an emailed statement. “Led by Charles and Laurent, we’re confident they can deliver on this mission and continue to support them.”
Enterprise software firm UiPath Inc. also invested in H, putting $32.5 million into the startup and promising to work on commercial deals together. UiPath didn’t respond to a request for comment.
“While this has been a difficult decision for all parties involved,” the startup wrote on LinkedIn, “all are in agreement that this will enable the company’s greatest success moving forward and H continues to have the full support of its investors and strategic partners.”
(Updates with Accel comment in eighth paragraph.)
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