According to the CEO of Hugging Face, more and more founders of AI startups are looking to sell their companies. This could be a sign of impending consolidation in the artificial intelligence market.
Hugging Face, a leading AI startup, announced on Thursday that it has agreed to pay $10 million for a small company called Argilla. This is its fourth acquisition so far. While Hugging Face approached the company about a merger, it is also receiving inquiries from many other companies.
Clément Delangue, co-founder and CEO of Hugging Face, told Bloomberg News that he hears from about 10 AI startups every week that are interested in being acquired. “This year, the number has increased particularly sharply,” he said.
Hugging Face, which makes artificial intelligence software and hosts it for other companies, could be a magnet for companies eager to be acquired because it has ample resources, Delangue said. The New York-based startup has 235 million US dollars in funding from investors last year, giving the company a valuation of $4.5 billion.
But the startup isn’t just waiting for companies to approach it. Hugging Face previously worked with Argilla, a company that builds software that lets people collaborate to improve the data sets used to train AI that can mimic human speech.
The startup’s 13 employees are joining Hugging Face, said Argilla co-founder and CEO Dani Vila Suero. Argilla will continue to operate as an independent team under the same name.