LONDON — A London-based artificial intelligence startup called Ineffable Intelligence announced Monday it has secured $1.1 billion in seed funding at a $5.1 billion valuation, in what investors are calling “a defining moment for the field” and also, quietly, “a lot of money for a company with no product.”

The round was led by Sequoia Capital and Lightspeed Venture Partners. Both firms issued statements praising the company’s “vision,” “ambition,” and “fundamental approach to the science of intelligence.” When asked to be more specific, both firms said they would follow up by email and have not yet done so.

Ineffable Intelligence was founded by David Silver, a former DeepMind researcher known for co-developing AlphaGo, the AI system that beat the world champion at Go in 2016 and has been cited in VC pitch decks ever since.

“Ineffable means something that cannot be expressed in words,” Silver said at a press conference Monday, when a journalist asked what the company name meant. “We chose it deliberately. The most important things in intelligence are, by nature, beyond articulation.”

A follow-up question asked what the company’s product was.

“Yes,” said Silver.

The Pitch

According to documents shared with investors, Ineffable Intelligence is working on “the fundamental science of intelligence itself” — a phrase that appears seventeen times in the thirty-two-page pitch deck, italicised on seven of those occasions and bolded on three.

The remaining content consists of a graph showing a line going up, a photograph of a neuron, and a quote from Wittgenstein.

Sources familiar with the raise say that Sequoia’s managing partner described the meeting as “one of the most intellectually stimulating two hours of my career,” and that the firm wired the money the following morning without requesting a product demo, a working prototype, or a definition of any of the nouns in the executive summary.

“There are bets you make on people,” the managing partner said in a statement. “And then there are bets you make on ideas so large that the people almost don’t matter. This is that second thing. We think.”

What It Is

Ineffable Intelligence has declined to describe its technology in terms that would allow a technical journalist to assess it. The company’s website, launched Monday, contains a short video of cascading numbers, the phrase “intelligence has limits — we are removing them,” and a waitlist form.

The waitlist, as of Monday afternoon, had 47,000 sign-ups.

“What we’re building,” said Silver, in the most specific statement he has yet made publicly, “is a system that learns not just from data, but from the act of learning itself. A kind of recursive epistemic engine.”

A neuroscientist in the audience wrote something in her notepad. She later confirmed she had written: “Is that just a neural network.”

Silver was not available to respond to this characterisation before press time, but a spokesperson said the company “respectfully declines the framing.”

Investor Confidence

Not all observers are convinced. Dr. Amara Osei, a professor of AI at Imperial College London, noted that the funding round values Ineffable Intelligence at $5.1 billion despite the company having, as far as anyone can verify, “no revenue, no customers, no published research, and a name that is technically a synonym for ‘indescribable.’”

“To be fair,” she added, “that last part might be load-bearing.”

On Hacker News, the announcement generated 847 comments. The top-voted comment read: “Founded by David Silver. I’m in.” The second read: “But what does it do.” The third read: “That’s the point.” The fourth read: “Is it, though.” The thread continued for eleven pages.

Anthropic, Google DeepMind, and OpenAI all issued statements wishing Ineffable Intelligence well. Each statement used the word “exciting.” None used the word “concerned.” This is not, sources stress, because they are not concerned.

At press time, Ineffable Intelligence had begun hiring. The open roles listed on its website include “Research Scientist,” “Research Engineer,” and, under a separate heading marked “Vision,” one position titled simply “Thinker.”

Salary: competitive. Location: London, with “significant philosophical flexibility.”

CCNN applied for the Thinker role. We received an automated response that said only: “Thank you. We’ll be in touch when the time is right.” We are not sure what that means. We found it oddly reassuring.