Source: Inference provider Modal Labs closing in on $750M round at $15.75B valuation

消息来源：AI 推理服务商 Modal Labs 即将完成 7.5 亿美元融资，估值达 157.5 亿美元

AI inference infrastructure provider Modal Labs is nearing a $750 million funding round led by Accel at a $15.75 billion valuation that includes the investment, according to a source with knowledge of the funding. The size of the round has not been previously reported, though Axios and Bloomberg have reported other details of the deal. 据一位知情人士透露，AI 推理基础设施提供商 Modal Labs 即将完成一轮由 Accel 领投的 7.5 亿美元融资，投后估值达到 157.5 亿美元。此前 Axios 和彭博社曾报道过该交易的其他细节，但本轮融资的具体金额此前尚未披露。

The new round would more than triple Modal’s valuation from the $4.65 billion it reached when it announced its $355 million previous fundraise just four months ago. Modal Labs declined to comment. 若此轮融资完成，Modal 的估值将比四个月前宣布 3.55 亿美元融资时 46.5 亿美元的估值翻了三倍多。Modal Labs 对此拒绝置评。

The deal comes amid soaring demand for inference services, the process of running an AI model that’s already been trained to generate outputs, particularly from customers relying on open-source models. Other inference startups are also in talks to raise fresh capital at much higher valuations. Baseten is nearing an infusion of capital at a $26 billion valuation, doubling what it was worth in June, Bloomberg reported. 此次交易正值推理服务需求激增之际。推理是指运行已训练好的 AI 模型以生成输出的过程，尤其是那些依赖开源模型的客户需求旺盛。其他推理初创公司也在商谈以更高估值筹集新资金。据彭博社报道，Baseten 即将获得注资，估值达到 260 亿美元，较 6 月份翻了一番。

Meanwhile, Fireworks and Fal, a startup providing inference for video and image generation, have also talked to investors about new rounds that would significantly increase their valuations, according to The Information. Although revenue for these companies has been growing rapidly, their margins are thin, largely because the cost of acquiring or leasing compute remains very high. 与此同时，据 The Information 报道，提供视频和图像生成推理服务的初创公司 Fireworks 和 Fal 也已与投资者商谈新一轮融资，预计将大幅提升其估值。尽管这些公司的收入增长迅速，但利润率却很低，这主要是因为获取或租赁计算资源的成本依然居高不下。

Fireworks announced in July that its annualized revenue had hit $1 billion, a fivefold increase from the year before. Multiple inference-focused startups are expected to reach the same revenue milestone by year’s end, according to our source. Fireworks 在 7 月份宣布其年化收入已达到 10 亿美元，较上一年增长了五倍。据我们的消息来源称，预计到今年年底，多家专注于推理的初创公司将达到同样的收入里程碑。

Modal was founded in 2021 by CEO Erik Bernhardsson and CTO Akshat Bubna. Bernhardsson, who is Swedish, spent more than 15 years building data teams at companies including Spotify, where he helped build the music-streaming service’s recommendation system, and Better.com, the online mortgage lender, where he served as chief technology officer. Bubna studied math and computer science at MIT and was an early staff engineer at Scale AI, the data-labeling startup, before co-founding Modal. Modal 由首席执行官 Erik Bernhardsson 和首席技术官 Akshat Bubna 于 2021 年创立。瑞典籍的 Bernhardsson 曾花费 15 年以上的时间在多家公司组建数据团队，包括 Spotify（他曾协助构建该音乐流媒体服务的推荐系统）和在线抵押贷款机构 Better.com（他曾担任首席技术官）。Bubna 曾在麻省理工学院学习数学和计算机科学，在联合创立 Modal 之前，他是数据标注初创公司 Scale AI 的早期员工工程师。

The company, which is based in New York and estimated to have roughly 150 employees, lets developers train AI models and run other compute-heavy workloads without managing their own servers. Its web page lists customers that include the coding startup Cognition, the AI music generator Suno, the fintech company Ramp, and the publishing platform Substack. As of May, Modal had surpassed $300 million in annualized revenue, it told Reuters at the time. 该公司总部位于纽约，估计拥有约 150 名员工。它允许开发人员在无需管理自有服务器的情况下训练 AI 模型并运行其他计算密集型工作负载。其网页列出的客户包括编码初创公司 Cognition、AI 音乐生成器 Suno、金融科技公司 Ramp 以及出版平台 Substack。Modal 当时告诉路透社，截至 5 月，其年化收入已超过 3 亿美元。

The fundraising talks come two months after Modal was pulled into one of the AI industry’s most closely watched security incidents. In late July, Modal disclosed that a customer’s data had been compromised as part of the same hacking campaign carried out by a rogue OpenAI agent against Hugging Face. Modal Chief Technology Officer Akshat Bubna said the breach traced back to a flaw in a customer’s own code, not to Modal’s systems. 此次融资谈判发生在该公司被卷入 AI 行业最受关注的安全事件两个月后。7 月下旬，Modal 披露其一名客户的数据遭到泄露，这与针对 Hugging Face 的恶意 OpenAI 代理发起的黑客攻击属于同一行动。Modal 首席技术官 Akshat Bubna 表示，此次泄露源于客户自身代码中的缺陷，而非 Modal 的系统问题。

“We’re aware a Modal customer published an unauthenticated endpoint that allowed anyone on the internet to use their sandboxes for code execution,” Bubna said in a statement to press outlets at the time. “This was used by the rogue agent. Modal’s platform was not compromised in any way,” he’d added. “我们注意到一名 Modal 客户发布了一个未经身份验证的端点，允许互联网上的任何人使用他们的沙箱执行代码，”Bubna 当时在给媒体的声明中表示。“这被恶意代理利用了。Modal 的平台没有受到任何形式的损害，”他补充道。