Insider Brief
- Sema4.ai has successfully raised $30.5M and acquired Robocorp to enhance AI for enterprise knowledge work.
- Their focus is to enable meaningful human-AI collaboration, especially for knowledge workers whose complex decision-making tasks are not yet fully supported by current AI technologies.
- The company believes in the importance of making Large Language Models (LLMs) programmable for complex tasks, enabling AI to respond and take action in real-world enterprise contexts.
PRESS RELEASE — January 29, 2024 — Strong backing enables acquisition of open source automation pioneer Robocorp, accelerating a new era of AI for enterprise knowledge work.
For the world’s billion knowledge workers, the promise of AI has yet to be realized. Large Language Models (LLMs) can summarize vast amounts of information and converse with humans but struggle to support and streamline the complex end-to-end workflows of knowledge workers. Existing enterprise automation solutions are limited to simple, repetitive point-to-point tasks because they lack the fundamental competencies for knowledge work such as the intelligence and reasoning to manage ambiguity, and the ability to adapt to changing enterprise context and take action.
Sema4.ai enables meaningful human-AI collaboration, supporting and streamlining the complex decision-making of knowledge workers. Customers can now harness the power of LLMs safely and securely throughout their most sensitive workflows moving from low-level, low-value automation to native, ground-up, AI-based agents.
Sema4.ai is on a mission to define the future of knowledge work by building intelligent agents that transform how knowledge workers collaborate with AI. Everything we do is driven by three core beliefs:
- Meaning is everything: For the first time, LLMs enable intent to be programmable, allowing users to express and execute complex tasks using natural language. We build intelligent agents with semantic meaning at their core.
- Action is essential: Meaningful tasks require the ability to take action. In order for AI applications to expand beyond search use cases, they must be able to respond to real-world conditions and take action against enterprise systems.
- Open source fuels innovation: Every meaningful innovation in the data, AI, and application space has unfolded in the open. We’re building a vibrant, inclusive community that gives AI application developers and automation engineers the tools needed to push the boundaries of human-AI collaboration and expand what’s possible.
To accelerate progress and turn our ambitious vision into reality, we’ve joined forces with Robocorp, pioneers of open source “automation as code.”
“Our founders each have a proven track record of building significant enterprise software businesses. Our acquisition of Robocorp was borne out of a deep conviction that intelligence without action is incomplete, and action without intelligence is, at best, non-strategic. Together, we’re well-positioned to build category-defining intelligent agents that connect context to action, changing how work gets done in the enterprise.” — Rob Bearden, CEO of Sema4.ai
We’re thankful to have the support of marquee investors like Benchmark and Mayfield.
“Benchmark’s relationship with Rob Bearden has spanned 20+ years of open source success stories with over $2B in current product revenue — from JBoss to, more recently, Cloudera. The pillars of his leadership, open source AI, and the agent technology of Robocorp will allow major enterprises to safely build, run, and manage paradigm-shifting AI applications, with the potency of an open source foundation that will only grow in strength with time.” — Peter Fenton, General Partner at Benchmark
“As a People First investor, it is an honor to partner with the experienced founding team behind Sema4.ai as they pursue a transformational GenAI opportunity to accelerate the $88 billion AI economy. Our investment in Sema4.ai reflects our belief that plumbing layers drive enterprise adoption during paradigm shifts. In the age of AI, we think of this as ‘cognitive plumbing’, as models/middleware/tools, data, infrastructure, and semis/systems automate cognitive tasks to unlock new possibilities.” — Navin Chaddha, Managing Partner of Mayfield Fund
We’ve hit the ground running. Today, we’re announcing a community release of our new Python-based AI Actions framework that integrates directly with LangChain and OpenAI.
Using our AI Actions framework, teams can immediately create simple and powerful agents that act against their enterprise systems using LLMs. AI Actions transform LLMs from information processors to active participants in enterprise systems and enable completely new and practical use cases for Generative AI.
“We are excited to work with Sema4.ai to make it possible for developers to define how AI applications take action against their enterprise systems and data. This collaboration represents the next step in the evolution of generative AI solutions. Together we are positively impacting the work life of millions of knowledge workers.” — Harrison Chase, co-founder and CEO of LangChain
“We see Python as the language of choice for developing AI applications, and that’s why we expanded the Robocorp platform to focus on ‘automation as code’. Our new integration with LangChain makes it possible for AI developers to use LLMs to take direct action against their enterprise applications and data, closing the loop from conversation to action to get real work done.” — Antti Karjalainen, Founder and CEO at Robocorp and co-founder of Sema4.ai
Sema4.ai is where the promise of AI meets the potential of people.
