Oct 23, 2019

Analytics company Databricks raises $400 million in Series F

Dan Primack

Databricks, a San Francisco-based data analytics SaaS company, raised $400 million in Series F funding led by Andreessen Horowitz at a $6.2 billion valuation.

Why it matters: Because this one can legitimately lay claim to all the hottest enterprise software buzzwords, from open-source to machine learning to cloud.

  • In short, its big promise is to help customers add AI to existing business software — kind of SaaS-upon-SaaS. Plus, it just added the CFO who helped take Splunk public.
  • Other investors include Alkeon Capital Management, BlackRock, Coatue, Dragoneer, Geodesic, Green Bay Ventures, NEA, T. Rowe Price, and Tiger Global.

The bottom line: "Databricks' platform is used by enterprises to analyze data, build data pipelines across siloed storage systems and prepare labeled datasets for model building. The idea is that organizations can then use the platform to train machine learning and other AI models using their existing data, writes SiliconAngle's Mike Wheatley.

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Kaveh Waddell

The dangers of "AI washing"

Illustration: Sarah Grillo/Axios

Zealous marketing departments, capital-hungry startup founders and overeager reporters are casting the futuristic sheen of artificial intelligence over many products that are actually driven by simple statistics — or hidden people.

Why it matters: This "AI washing" threatens to overinflate expectations for the technology, undermining public trust and potentially setting up the booming field for a backlash.

Go deeperArrowNov 16, 2019
Kaveh Waddell

The hidden costs of AI

Illustration: Eniola Odetunde/Axios

In the most exclusive AI conferences and journals, AI systems are judged largely on their accuracy: How well do they stack up against human-level translation or vision or speech?

Yes, but: In the messy real world, even the most accurate programs can stumble and break. Considerations that matter little in the lab, like reliability or computing and environmental costs, are huge hurdles for businesses.

Go deeperArrowOct 26, 2019
Erica Pandey, Kim Hart

AI is coming for white-collar workers

Data: The Brookings Institution; Chart: Axios Visuals

While robots upend blue-collar factory work and trucking in the middle of the country, AI and machine learning are poised to deeply alter white-collar jobs in superstar coastal cities.

Why it matters: No one is immune to the shockwave of automation in the workplace.

Go deeperArrowNov 20, 2019 - Technology