Reid Hoffman launches a new startup for the first time since he sold LinkedIn to Microsoft for $26.2 billion in 2016

It’s been six years since LinkedIn Co-Founder Reid Hoffman sold his company to Microsoft for $26.2 billion. Hoffman founded LinkedIn in December 2002 with the founding team members from PayPal and Socialnet.com. Since he sold the company in 2016, Hoffman has been busy investing in other tech startups including Worldcoin, a crypto tech startup co-founded by tech millionaire Sam Altman.

Now, Hoffman is back with a new venture, an artificial intelligence startup with a focus on machine learning and natural language processing. This week, CNBC reported that Hoffman has co-founded a new artificial intelligence start-up called Inflection AI with DeepMind co-founder Mustafa Suleyman and former DeepMind researcher Karén Simonyan.

Inflection AI is also the first company Suleyman has co-founded since he sold DeepMind to Google in 2014 for around $600 million. In a statement, Suleyman said, “Reid and I are excited to announce that we are co-founding a new company, Inflection AI.” He added, “Inflection will be an AI-first consumer products company, incubated at Greylock, with all the advantages and expertise that come from being part of one of the most storied venture capital firms in the world.”

“Inflection is an AI-first company, redefining human-computer interaction, co-founded by Mustafa Suleyman, Reid Hoffman, and Karén Simonyan,” the company said on its website. Inflection will be led by Suleyman, who will take on the role of CEO while Dr. Karén Simonyan, another former DeepMind AI expert, will serve as Inflection AI’s chief scientist and its third co-founder.

“Karén is one of the most accomplished deep learning leaders of his generation. He completed his PhD at Oxford, where he designed VGGNet and then sold his first company to DeepMind,” Suleyman noted.

“He created and led the deep learning scaling team and played a key role in such breakthroughs as AlphaZero, AlphaFold, WaveNet, and BigGAN.”

“Recent advances in artificial intelligence promise to fundamentally redefine human-machine interaction,” explains Suleyman.

“We will soon have the ability to relay our thoughts and ideas to computers using the same natural, conversational language we use to communicate with people. Over time these new language capabilities will revolutionize what it means to have a digital experience.”

Before joining Google, Suleyman co-founded DeepMind in London with childhood friend Demis Hassabis and New Zealander Shane Legg in 2010. He later departed Google in January 2022 following an eight-year stint at the company. While at Google, Suleyman was placed on administrative leave following bullying allegations. During a podcast, he said that he “really screwed up” and was “very sorry about the impact that caused people and the hurt people felt.”

Then, Suleyman joined venture capital firm Greylock after leaving Google. “There are few people who are as visionary, knowledgeable, and connected across the vast artificial intelligence landscape as Mustafa,” wrote Hoffman, a Greylock partner, in a post at the time.

“Mustafa has spent years thinking about how technological advances impact society, and he cares deeply about the ethics and governance supporting new AI systems.”