We are thrilled to announce our investment in CuspAI, the AI-powered platform for next-generation materials to tackle global sustainability and clean energy challenges. Northzone is participating in this $30 million Seed funding round alongside a group of leading European and US venture funds, including Hoxton Ventures, BasisSet Ventures, Localglobe and Lightspeed Venture Partners. We were also joined by angel investors, notably Deepmind.
Founded by Prof. Max Welling, professor in Machine Learning at the University of Amsterdam and former Distinguished Scientist and VP at Microsoft Research and Qualcomm, as well as Dr. Chad Edwards, a chemist with extensive experience in deep-tech commercialisation, CuspAI stood out to us with its unique approach to leverage generative AI, deep learning, and molecular simulation to streamline the material design process.
The CuspAI platform enables users to rapidly generate and evaluate novel material structures with specific properties, significantly accelerating the R&D and commercialisation processes. Under the hood, the platform is powered by a proprietary set of generative models, along with bespoke evaluation, training, and optimisation infrastructure. This combination helps bridge the historical gap between material structure generation and real-world performance.
At Northzone, we see the next wave of innovation at the foundation model layer emerging from specialised models for domains such as biology, chemistry, and material sciences. Max and other members of the CuspAI team were early AI pioneers who have made major contributions in pushing AI research forward. We’re excited by the opportunity to apply state-of-the-art research to these novel domains that will help solve some of the world’s most pressing challenges.
Michiel Kotting shares: “We are incredibly excited about the category-defining company that CuspAI is building. We’ve seen major advances in other scientific domains like biology, while material sciences remain relatively untapped. We believe that Max and Chad’s unparalleled knowledge in both AI and material science, combined with their expertise in commercialising deeptech, position them to become a global leader in this space.”
CuspAI has already assembled a world-class team and board of advisors, who are motivated to ensure the latest advances in AI have a positive societal impact. They have also striked a partnership with Meta to further its open science contributions focused on the discovery of new materials to address climate change.
We are excited to partner with Max, Chad, and the entire CuspAI team as they drive sustainable innovation across industries.