Jeff Bezos is returning to an operational role. He has joined a new artificial intelligence start-up called Project Prometheus as co-chief executive. The company is launching with $6.2 billion in funding, and Bezos has contributed part of that amount. According to three people familiar with the project, this makes it one of the best-funded early-stage start-ups in the world, reported The New York Times.

This move marks Bezos’ first formal executive role since he stepped down as Amazon’s CEO in July 2021. Although he remains active at Blue Origin, he holds only the founder title. Since leaving Amazon, he has drawn public attention because of his personal life, including a lavish wedding in Venice, and his increased focus on Blue Origin. He has also shown growing interest in the rapidly advancing AI sector.

Entering a Fierce AI Race

Project Prometheus pushes Bezos into the centre of the competitive AI industry. Smaller companies are trying to secure space in a field dominated by giants like Google, Meta, Microsoft, OpenAI and Anthropic. The start-up has kept a low profile. Its founding date and headquarters remain unknown.

The company will build AI systems to support engineering and manufacturing. Its work will cover fields such as computing, aerospace and automotive technology. This vision aligns with Bezos’ long-standing interest in space exploration.

Bezos and Vik Bajaj Will Lead the Company

Bezos will run the start-up with co-founder Vik Bajaj, a physicist and chemist. Bajaj previously worked with Google co-founder Sergey Brin at Google X, the division famous for “Moonshot” projects. Google X produced innovations such as the Wing drone delivery program and the self-driving technology that became Waymo.

In 2015, Bajaj also helped start Verily, Alphabet’s life sciences lab. He later co-founded Foresite Labs in 2018. According to the same three sources, he left his latest role to focus fully on Project Prometheus.

AI Focused on the Physical World

Project Prometheus joins a new wave of companies applying AI to physical sciences, robotics, and complex research. This trend gained speed in recent years. Researchers have left Meta, OpenAI, Google DeepMind and others to create start-ups such as Periodic Labs, which aims to speed up discoveries in physics and chemistry.

Bezos also invested last year in Physical Intelligence, a robotics-focused AI firm. With $6.2 billion, Project Prometheus now enters the high-cost AI race with significant momentum. For comparison, Thinking Machines Lab, started by former OpenAI employees, raised $2 billion this year.

A Rapidly Growing Team

The start-up has already hired nearly 100 employees, including researchers from top AI institutions like OpenAI, DeepMind and Meta, according to people familiar with the recruiting.

Major AI companies are already racing to accelerate progress in physical sciences. OpenAI, Google and Meta all promote AI tools that can drive scientific breakthroughs. Two Google DeepMind researchers recently won a Nobel Prize in Chemistry for their work on AlphaFold, a system transforming drug discovery.

Moving Beyond Large Language Models

However, Project Prometheus and Periodic Labs aim to go beyond language models. Large language models study huge amounts of digital text and mimic human writing. But the new start-ups want AI systems that also learn from the physical world.

Periodic Labs plans to build a major research lab in Northern California. There, robots will conduct scientific experiments at scale. By analysing the results, AI could learn through physical trial and error.

Prometheus May Explore Similar Paths

People familiar with Project Prometheus say the company is expected to explore this kind of advanced physical learning as well.