Multiverse Computing, a quantum-inspired AI model compression company, has developed CompactifAI, a compression technology capable of reducing the size of LLMs (Large Language Models) by up to 95% while maintaining model performance. Having spent last year developing the technology and rolling it out to initial customers, the company also recently announced a €189 million ($215 million) investment round. The Series B funding round will be led by Bullhound Capital with the support of HP Tech Ventures, SETT, Forgepoint Capital International, CDP Venture Capital, Santander Climate VC, Quantonation, Toshiba and Capital Riesgo de Euskadi – Grupo SPRI.
LLMs typically run on specialized, cloud-based infrastructure, which drives up data center costs. And traditional compression techniques—quantization and pruning—aim to address these challenges, but their resulting models significantly underperform original LLMs.
Through the development of CompactifAI, Multiverse discovered a new approach. CompactifAI models are highly compressed versions of leading open-source LLMs that retain original accuracy, are 4x-12x faster, and yield a 50%-80% reduction in inference costs. These compressed, affordable, energy-efficient models can run on the cloud, on private data centers or—in the case of ultra compressed LLMs—directly on devices such as PCs, phones, cars, drones and even Raspberry Pi.
CompactifAI was created with Tensor Networks, a quantum-inspired approach to simplifying neural networks. And Tensor Networks is a specialized field of study pioneered by Román Orús, Co-Founder and Chief Scientific Officer at Multiverse.
How the funding will be used: The funding will accelerate widespread adoption to address the massive costs prohibiting the rollout of LLMs, transforming the AI inference market.
KEY QUOTES:
“The prevailing wisdom is that shrinking LLMs comes at a cost. Multiverse is changing that. What started as a breakthrough in model compression quickly proved transformative—unlocking new efficiencies in AI deployment and earning rapid adoption for its ability to radically reduce the hardware requirements for running AI models. With a unique syndicate of expert and strategic global investors on board and Bullhound Capital as lead investor, we can now further advance our laser-focused delivery of compressed AI models that offer outstanding performance with minimal infrastructure.”
Enrique Lizaso Olmos, Founder and CEO of Multiverse Computing
“For the first time in history, we are able to profile the inner workings of a neural network to eliminate billions of spurious correlations to truly optimize all sorts of AI models.”
Román Orús, Co-Founder and Chief Scientific Officer at Multiverse
“Multiverse’s CompactifAI introduces material changes to AI processing that address the global need for greater efficiency in AI, and their ingenuity is accelerating European sovereignty. Román Orús has convinced us that he and his team of engineers are developing truly world-class solutions in this highly complex and compute intensive field. Enrique Lizaso is the perfect CEO for rapidly expanding the business in a global race for AI dominance. I am also pleased to see that so many high-profile investors such as HP and Forgepoint decided to join the round. We welcome their participation.”
Per Roman, Co-founder & Managing Partner, Bullhound Capital
“At HP, we are dedicated to leading the future of work by providing solutions that drive business growth and enhance professional fulfillment. Our investment in Multiverse Computing supports this ambition. By making AI applications more accessible at the edge, Multiverse’s innovative approach has the potential to bring AI benefits of enhanced performance, personalization, privacy and cost efficiency to life for companies of any size.”
Tuan Tran, President of Technology and Innovation, HP
“The Multiverse team has solved a deeply complex problem with sweeping implications. The company is well-positioned to be a foundational layer of the AI infrastructure stack. Multiverse represents a quantum leap for the global deployment and application of AI models, enabling smarter, cheaper and greener AI. This is only just the beginning of a massive market opportunity.”
Damien Henault, Managing Director, Forgepoint Capital International
