Google joined Japanese startup Sakana AI’s roster of backers in a move that bolsters chatbot Gemini’s presence in a country eager to speed up artificial intelligence adoption.
The investment follows a $135 million Series B funding round that valued the startup at about $2.6 billion last year. Sakana did not disclose an investment sum.
Through the deal, the US company gains the help of one of Japan’s most valuable startups to promote Gemini in a cash-rich corporate landscape where it trails OpenAI’s ChatGPT. At the same time, Sakana is able to tap Alphabet Inc.’s language models to develop products and enhance reliability in critical services, according to David Ha, the startup’s co-founder and chief executive officer.
“Having more access to more foundation models, especially from Google, will improve the performance of our products,” said Ha, a former Google Brain researcher, in an interview.
The AI race in corporate Japan remains wide open because of a reluctance to change business models that — in some cases — have been built over decades. But backed by the likes of Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group Inc., Sakana has made inroads into the country’s finance sector, winning service contracts from MUFG Bank Ltd. and Daiwa Securities Group Inc. to build AI tools.
Founded in 2023, Sakana quickly won a government-backed grant in a country eager to develop AI built on its own language and not reliant on US companies. The startup seeks to work more closely with the Defense Ministry and other government agencies this year, on top of expanding its enterprise client base and growing overseas, Ha said, adding that Sakana may not be able to use foreign models on certain projects.
“If we do make progress in both defense and enterprises, if we do see success in these, we could require more capital,” he said.
