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\t\t\tIllustration by Tag Hartman-Simkins \/ Futurism. Source: Getty Images\n\t<\/p>\n
In a way, Silicon Valley has always asked investors to suspend disbelief to fund pie-in-the-sky projects, but the AI boom calls for something closer to a full break from financial reality.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s 2026. Last year, investors lavished $80 billion<\/a> on foundation AI companies \u2014 the ones building huge, general-purpose AI systems. They all have yet to even break even, let alone turn a profit<\/a>. That being the case, you may ask yourself: is anyone even trying to make money from all this AI stuff?<\/p>\n The answer, as TechCrunch AI editor Russell Brandom<\/a> explains, is a resounding \u201cnot really, no.\u201d<\/p>\n In order to keep track of who\u2018s doing what in the AI space, Brandom came up with a five-level scale to grade AI companies. Of course, with so few projects actually bringing in revenue, financial success isn\u2019t very helpful for tracking performance. Instead, Brandom went with a vibes-based system, rating companies based on how hard they\u2019re trying to make money.<\/p>\n \u201cThe idea here is to measure ambition, not\u00a0success,\u201d he writes.<\/p>\n The scale maxes out at level five \u2014 \u201cwe are already making millions of dollars every day, thank you very much\u201d \u2014 and goes down to level one, where \u201ctrue wealth is when you love yourself.\u201d<\/p>\n Brandom starts with humans&, a relatively quiet AI company with a name that looks like a typo which has received plenty of good<\/a> press<\/a> lately. Despite raising $480 million<\/a> for a valuation of $4.48 billion, the company has yet to articulate<\/a> an actual product it plans on shipping, earning it a rating of level three, meaning \u201cwe have many promising product ideas, which will be revealed in\u00a0the fullness of time.\u201d<\/p>\n Safe Superintelligence (SSI), a hazy \u201csuperintelligent AI\u201d company founded by Ilya Sutskever, the eccentric former chief scientist<\/a> of OpenAI, gets a level one. SSI is so committed to its vague vision that it turned down a $32 billion acquisition from Meta<\/a> \u2014 an incredibly generous offer for a company that had yet to generate any revenue<\/a> at the time of its $20 billion valuation.<\/p>\n \u201cThere are no product cycles, and, aside from the still-baking superintelligent foundation model, there\u00a0doesn\u2019t\u00a0seem to be any product at all,\u201d Brandom writes. \u201cWith this pitch, [Sutskever] raised\u00a0$3 billion!\u201d<\/p>\n Meanwhile, the $2 billion company Thinking Machines Lab could be due for a downgrade from level four to level two, \u201cwe have the outlines of a concept of a plan.\u201d Thinking Machines Lab was co-founded by Mira Murati, who had served as the chief technology officer \u2014 and very briefly as CEO, during the mutiny against Sam Altman<\/a> \u2014 at OpenAI. Now Thinking Machines is suffering something of a coup of its own over recent weeks, the New York Times reported<\/a>, with high-level officials defecting to other AI companies as the much-hyped startup descends into a \u201cperpetual soap opera.\u201d<\/p>\n One thing\u2019s for sure: if confidence could be bottled and sold, these companies would be profitable on day one.<\/p>\n