BlackRock Leads $250M Funding In AI Computing Startup

Artificial intelligence startup SambaNova Systems on Tuesday said it had raised $250 million in a Series C funding round.

What Happened

The funding round was led by financial giant BlackRock, Inc. BLK and saw participation from SambaNova's previous investors including Intel Corporation INTC, Alphabet Inc.'s GOOGL GOOG venture arm GV, Walden International, and WRVI Capital.

"Raising [$250 million] in this funding round with support from new and existing investors puts us in a unique category of capitalization," CEO Rodrigo Liang said in a statement. "This enables us to further extend our market leadership in enterprise computing."

SambaNova, which provides the infrastructure for running AI and computer-intensive applications, had previously announced a $150 million Series B funding led by Intel and GV.

Price Action

BlackRock's shares closed 4.17% lower at $506 on Tuesday.

Intel closed 3.29% lower at $59.73 and inched higher in the after-hours session at $59.91.

Alphabet's Class A shares closed 2.36% lower at $1,386.32 and traded 0.9% higher in the after-hours session at $1,398.79.

Class C shares closed 2.33% lower at $1,388.45. The stock traded 0.47% higher at $1,395.00 in the after-hours market.