Core Automation
Category: Foundation Models / LLMs
AI research lab building continual-learning models and new architectures beyond transformer scaling, founded by ex-OpenAI VP of Research Jerry Tworek. Core Automation was founded in 2026. The company is led by Jerry Tworek. Based in San Francisco, USA. Team size: 11-50. Total funding raised: $100M. Latest round: Venture Round. Key investors include Nvidia, Spark Capital, Accel.
- Founded
- 2026
- Headquarters
- San Francisco, USA
- Team size
- 11-50
- Total funding
- $100M
Value proposition
Pursuing new learning algorithms and architectures that supersede large-scale pretraining/RL, aiming for models that continually learn from real-world experience with ~100x less training data, enabling small teams to do frontier-scale work.
Products and solutions
Flagship research project codenamed 'Ceres' — a continual-learning model architecture targeting a 100-fold reduction in training data versus current state-of-the-art models, broader mission to build 'the most automated AI lab in the world' starting by automating its own research process.
Unique value
Continual learning models that update from real-world/production experience post-training, plus architectures designed to scale better than transformers — a contrarian bet against the dominant scale-more-data-and-compute paradigm.
Target customer
Not yet commercialized — currently a pure research lab in fundraising/talent-acquisition stage; no disclosed enterprise customers.
Industries served
Frontier AI research / foundation models
Technology advantage
Founding team combines frontier model-building experience (o1/o3, Codex, GPT-4/5) with recruits poached from OpenAI, Anthropic, and Google DeepMind; small-team-plus-highly-capable-agents operating model designed to compound research velocity.
How they differentiate
Explicitly rejects the 'scale current recipe' approach (larger models, more data, static deployment) in favor of continual learning algorithms and non-transformer architectures, run by an extremely small, highly automated team rather than a large org.
Main competitors
OpenAI, Anthropic, Google DeepMind (frontier AI labs also competing for continual-learning/next-gen-architecture talent and capital)
Key partnerships
Reported investor/compute relationship with Nvidia (participated in initial funding round), no other formal partnerships publicly disclosed.
Major milestones
Founded ~January-March 2026 following Tworek's departure from OpenAI, closed an initial ~$100M round with Nvidia, Spark Capital, and Accel, recruited senior researchers from OpenAI, Anthropic, and Google DeepMind within weeks of launch, as of the anchor news (Aug 2026), reportedly in talks to raise an additional $300M-$1B at a $4-5B valuation, a ~4x valuation jump in weeks — this larger round appears to be in progress, not yet confirmed closed.
Market positioning
Ultra-early-stage but extremely high-profile frontier AI lab, positioned as a contrarian alternative research bet attracting outsized investor interest just weeks after founding.
Geographic focus
Global frontier AI race, primarily US-centered (competing with SF/Bay Area labs)
About Jerry Tworek
OpenAI VP of Research (2019-2026); led development of o1/o3 reasoning models and post-training of GPT-4/GPT-5; primary researcher behind Codex (foundation for GitHub Copilot); Uniwersytet Warszawski (University of Warsaw) education; started as quantitative trader turned deep RL researcher.
Latest news about Core Automation
- Core Automation, founded by former OpenAI VP of Research Jerry Tworek, is reportedly seeking between 500 million and 1 billion dollars in fresh funding. With a potential valuation exceeding 5 billion
- Core Automation, founded by an ex-OpenAI researcher, is targeting $1 billion in funding for a new type of autonomous AI. This round signals a systemic shift from chatbots to agentic models capable of
More Foundation Models / LLMs companies
Official website: https://www.coreauto.com/