The generative AI-based fact checking firm launched by two Humane.AI expats is off to the races with $4 million in seed funding. The early round, led by Bee Partners, features a16z’s Scout Fund, Alumni Ventures, and FJ Labs. It values Infactory at $25 million.
The San Francisco startup broke cover in July by ways of a TechCrunch article. Among the more notable elements of the story was Brooke Hartley Moy and Ken Kocienda’s decision to jump ship at a struggling Humane. Prior to that, Kocienda worked 15 years as a software engineer for Apple’s iPhone. Along with co-founding the company, Hartley Moy and Kocienda serve as CEO and CTO, respectively.
Infactory’s use of generative AI while the technology is white hot no doubt piqued investor interest. So, too, did the promise of addressing the very real problem of online fact-checking.
The young company is quick to point out the ways in which large language models (LLMs) won’t be utilized on its platform. Specifically, they will be used to determine the intent of natural language search queries, rather than the results themselves. After all, the black box nature and built-in biases of large models run counter to the point of a fact-checking service. Questionable Gemini search results are clear evidence of this phenomenon.
As Hartley Moy told TechCrunch in July, a fair bit of vetting informs the decision of which sources to prioritize.
“Our goal here is to be selective from a partnership perspective,” she noted at the time. “Not all data partners are created equal. I think the reason that we are focusing more on the data vendors over the content providers is that, when it comes to things that are more computational, more based in fact, their business is ensuring that those things are accurate.”
The new funding round will go toward expanding the team and ramping up Infactory’s go-to-market.