Latest news with #DensityAI
India Today
12 hours ago
- Automotive
- India Today
Meet Ganesh Venkataramanan, the ex-Tesla Dojo chief secretly building DensityAI with 20 former teammates
Ganesh Venkataramanan (Photo: LinkedIn) Ganesh Venkataramanan leads DensityAI, a startup focused on automotive AI Around 20 ex-Tesla Dojo engineers have joined DensityAI Startup aims to simplify costly AI infrastructure for carmakers A stealthy new player has just pulled into the fast lane of the automotive AI race, and it's being driven by a man who knows a thing or two about horsepower in the digital age. Ganesh Venkataramanan, the former mastermind behind Tesla's Dojo supercomputer project, has resurfaced at the wheel of DensityAI, a startup aiming to supercharge how automakers train and deploy self-driving technology. And he hasn't come alone, around 20 of his old Tesla colleagues, many senior members of the Dojo engineering squad, are riding shotgun. The mission? Build a full-stack AI platform, from chips to software, designed specifically for the unique demands of the automotive world. Unlike generic AI systems, DensityAI wants to create hardware and tools optimised for the immense data-crunching required by autonomous vehicles, covering everything from sensor fusion and simulation to edge computing. From Tesla's Dojo to DensityAI Venkataramanan left Tesla in late 2023 after a seven-year stint that saw him lead Dojo, the custom-built supercomputer used to train Tesla's neural networks on a flood of driving footage. Before that, he honed his chip-design credentials at AMD. Now, he's channelling that expertise into a new platform that could remove one of the biggest headaches for carmakers: building and maintaining costly AI infrastructure in-house. Self-driving technology demands colossal computing muscle, and the data centres needed to power it are often as complex to manage as the cars themselves. DensityAI is positioning itself as the plug-and-play solution â€' delivering high-performance, high-density computing tailored for the realities of the road. Nvidia might dominate the automotive AI chip market today. Still, several reports claim DensityAI could grab a chunk of the action by zooming in on automotive-specific needs, instead of the one-size-fits-all approach favoured by bigger players. Early whispers suggest the company is already in talks with manufacturers and eyeing a major funding round worth hundreds of millions as it emerges from stealth mode. While the startup's primary focus is on cars, its ambitions stretch further. Robotics and other industries reliant on real-time AI processing are also in its sights, with the broader aim of creating data centre infrastructure that can scale efficiently across sectors. Venkataramanan's departure is just the latest in a line of high-profile exits from Tesla's AI ranks. In 2023, Andrej Karpathy, the company's former AI director, headed back to OpenAI. Others have left to start ventures of their own or voice concerns about the complexity and safety hurdles of delivering true autonomy. Tesla itself isn't slowing down, it's reportedly teaming up with Samsung on its next-gen AI chips, but the flow of talent into new, specialised startups like DensityAI highlights shifting dynamics in the sector. Industry experts caution that breaking into this market isn't just about clever engineering. Developing reliable, scalable AI systems for vehicles is a long game, and the road is lined with regulatory speed bumps. Automakers face intense scrutiny when it comes to safety, testing, and deployment, making trust as important as raw performance. Even so, DensityAI's founders have a rare advantage: they've already built one of the most sophisticated AI training platforms on the planet. If they can apply that same focus to solving the bottlenecks facing carmakers, they could help speed up the rollout of safer, smarter autonomous systems. Observers on X have dubbed DensityAI a 'full-stack AI data centre company', meaning it plans to compete on both the hardware and the software fronts. That holistic approach could prove to be a game-changer, giving automakers a one-stop shop for training, deploying, and maintaining their AI. DensityAI's first products, expected to launch in the coming months, will aim to help carmakers train and deploy AI faster, more intelligently, and more cost-effectively. If Venkataramanan and his crew pull it off, they won't just be tweaking how cars think, they could redefine how the entire industry processes data. After all, this is a team that's already built a record-breaking AI system once. Now, they're betting they can do it again, and this time, the whole automotive world might be along for the ride. A stealthy new player has just pulled into the fast lane of the automotive AI race, and it's being driven by a man who knows a thing or two about horsepower in the digital age. Ganesh Venkataramanan, the former mastermind behind Tesla's Dojo supercomputer project, has resurfaced at the wheel of DensityAI, a startup aiming to supercharge how automakers train and deploy self-driving technology. And he hasn't come alone, around 20 of his old Tesla colleagues, many senior members of the Dojo engineering squad, are riding shotgun. The mission? Build a full-stack AI platform, from chips to software, designed specifically for the unique demands of the automotive world. Unlike generic AI systems, DensityAI wants to create hardware and tools optimised for the immense data-crunching required by autonomous vehicles, covering everything from sensor fusion and simulation to edge computing. From Tesla's Dojo to DensityAI Venkataramanan left Tesla in late 2023 after a seven-year stint that saw him lead Dojo, the custom-built supercomputer used to train Tesla's neural networks on a flood of driving footage. Before that, he honed his chip-design credentials at AMD. Now, he's channelling that expertise into a new platform that could remove one of the biggest headaches for carmakers: building and maintaining costly AI infrastructure in-house. Self-driving technology demands colossal computing muscle, and the data centres needed to power it are often as complex to manage as the cars themselves. DensityAI is positioning itself as the plug-and-play solution â€' delivering high-performance, high-density computing tailored for the realities of the road. Nvidia might dominate the automotive AI chip market today. Still, several reports claim DensityAI could grab a chunk of the action by zooming in on automotive-specific needs, instead of the one-size-fits-all approach favoured by bigger players. Early whispers suggest the company is already in talks with manufacturers and eyeing a major funding round worth hundreds of millions as it emerges from stealth mode. While the startup's primary focus is on cars, its ambitions stretch further. Robotics and other industries reliant on real-time AI processing are also in its sights, with the broader aim of creating data centre infrastructure that can scale efficiently across sectors. Venkataramanan's departure is just the latest in a line of high-profile exits from Tesla's AI ranks. In 2023, Andrej Karpathy, the company's former AI director, headed back to OpenAI. Others have left to start ventures of their own or voice concerns about the complexity and safety hurdles of delivering true autonomy. Tesla itself isn't slowing down, it's reportedly teaming up with Samsung on its next-gen AI chips, but the flow of talent into new, specialised startups like DensityAI highlights shifting dynamics in the sector. Industry experts caution that breaking into this market isn't just about clever engineering. Developing reliable, scalable AI systems for vehicles is a long game, and the road is lined with regulatory speed bumps. Automakers face intense scrutiny when it comes to safety, testing, and deployment, making trust as important as raw performance. Even so, DensityAI's founders have a rare advantage: they've already built one of the most sophisticated AI training platforms on the planet. If they can apply that same focus to solving the bottlenecks facing carmakers, they could help speed up the rollout of safer, smarter autonomous systems. Observers on X have dubbed DensityAI a 'full-stack AI data centre company', meaning it plans to compete on both the hardware and the software fronts. That holistic approach could prove to be a game-changer, giving automakers a one-stop shop for training, deploying, and maintaining their AI. DensityAI's first products, expected to launch in the coming months, will aim to help carmakers train and deploy AI faster, more intelligently, and more cost-effectively. If Venkataramanan and his crew pull it off, they won't just be tweaking how cars think, they could redefine how the entire industry processes data. After all, this is a team that's already built a record-breaking AI system once. Now, they're betting they can do it again, and this time, the whole automotive world might be along for the ride. Join our WhatsApp Channel
Yahoo
a day ago
- Business
- Yahoo
Former Tesla Executives Create Data Center Firm DensityAI
(Bloomberg) -- Former leaders of Tesla Inc.'s supercomputer program have started a new artificial intelligence company focused on data center services for industries from automotive to robotics, according to people familiar with the matter. All Hail the Humble Speed Hump Mayor Asked to Explain $1.4 Billion of Wasted Johannesburg Funds Three Deaths Reported as NYC Legionnaires' Outbreak Spreads Major Istanbul Projects Are Stalling as City Leaders Sit in Jail PATH Train Service Resumes After Fire at Jersey City Station DensityAI, which is poised to come out of stealth soon, is in talks to raise hundreds of millions of dollars, said the people, who asked not to be identified because the information is private. The startup was founded by Ganesh Venkataramanan — the former head of Tesla's Dojo team — and ex-Tesla employees Bill Chang and Ben Floering. Representatives of DensityAI didn't provide comment. The startup is working on chips, hardware and software that will power data centers for AI that are used in robotics, by AI agents and in automotive applications, among other sectors, the people said. Roughly 20 former members of Tesla's Dojo project — including some senior-level individuals — have joined DensityAI, the people said, along with other engineers from across the technology industry. Martin Viecha, Tesla's former head of investor relations, has also joined the startup as an adviser, the people said. Dojo is Tesla's in-house effort for chips and servers that power data centers. The initiative's computing capabilities are used to train Tesla's neural networks used in its autonomous driving software and humanoid robotics projects. Tesla's shares erased earlier postmarket gains and were little changed as of 6:28 p.m. in New York. (Updates with postmarket shares, adds detail on DensityAI's objectives from first paragraph.) Russia's Secret War and the Plot to Kill a German CEO The Pizza Oven Startup With a Plan to Own Every Piece of the Pie AI Flight Pricing Can Push Travelers to the Limit of Their Ability to Pay Government Steps Up Campaign Against Business School Diversity A High-Rise Push Is Helping Mumbai Squeeze in Pools, Gyms and Greenery ©2025 Bloomberg L.P. Error in retrieving data Sign in to access your portfolio Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data
Engadget
2 days ago
- Automotive
- Engadget
Tesla shuts down in-house Dojo AI supercomputer project
As first reported by Bloomberg , Tesla is disbanding the team behind Dojo , its in-house AI-training supercomputer, and reassigning remaining staff to other projects within the company. This marks a shift in the company's compute sourcing strategy for its AI-focused initiatives such as autonomous driving and the Optimus robot . Head of Dojo Peter Bannon is leaving Tesla, which is the latest departure after roughly 20 Dojo team members recently left to form DensityAI . In a response to the Bloomberg report on X, Tesla CEO Elon Musk said , "It doesn't make sense for Tesla to divide its resources and scale two quite different AI chip designs. The Tesla AI5, AI6 and subsequent chips will be excellent for inference and at least pretty good for training. All effort is focused on that." Musk is referring to Tesla's next-generation AI6 chip that will be made by Samsung following a $16.5 billion deal . These chips will drive the real-time decision-making onboard Tesla vehicles and robots. Shutting down Dojo effectively ends Tesla's long-shot ambition of creating its own in-house training architecture and consolidates the company's efforts on the AI5 and AI6 platforms. While Musk says these chips are "pretty good" for training, the company will now rely heavily on vendors like NVIDIA for training-specific silicon, and is spending billions on those chips. AI5 production is targeted to begin in 2026 with AI6 to follow. Like the rest of the big tech world, Musk's companies have been on an AI tear, with xAI's Grok chatbot now available in Tesla vehicles. The company is also piloting its Robotaxi fleet to mixed results . If you buy something through a link in this article, we may earn commission.
The Verge
2 days ago
- Automotive
- The Verge
Tesla's Dojo supercomputer is DOA — now what?
On Thursday, Bloomberg reported that Tesla CEO Elon Musk has ordered its Dojo supercomputer project to be disbanded after the project's leader and most of its employees left to join another AI project. The news marked a major setback to the automaker's efforts to develop its own in-house developed supercomputer to train AI models for self-driving cars. And it signaled yet another blow to Tesla's ongoing efforts to retain its top talent. For years, Tesla touted its custom built supercomputer meant to train machine-learning models for Tesla's Autopilot, Full Self-Driving, and Optimus robots as the thing that will give it the leg up over other autonomous vehicle developers. While the rest of the industry was relying on external suppliers for compute and chips, Tesla would design its hardware in-house. According to Musk's vision, a vertically integrated AI effort would allow Tesla to leapfrog over its more supply-constrained competitors. Technical delays and a talent exodus seemed to push success further and further away But technical delays and a talent exodus seemed to push success further and further away. In 2018, Jim Keller, the famed AI chip developer who was first hired to lead Tesla's chip making efforts, left. His successor, Ganesh Venkataramanan, left in 2023 to found Density AI. The latest to leave is Peter Bannon, who had been leading Dojo since Venkataramanan's departure. He is also joining Density AI, along with 20 other ex-Tesla engineers. Other Tesla executives to head for the exits in recent months include Milan Kovac, head of engineering for Optimus, David Lau, VP of software engineering, and Omead Afshar, one of Musk's closest lieutenants. After Bloomberg reported the developments, Musk confirmed Tesla's change in approach, writing on X that the next-generation AI chips going into the company's vehicles 'will be excellent for inference and at least pretty good for training. All effort is focused on that.' Depending where you stand on Tesla, the move is either a glaring sign that the company's AI efforts are overhyped and underwhelming or it's a savvy move to save money in an extremely capital-intensive race to build robotaxis and humanoid robots. Either way, there's no question the decision represents a major pivot from what Musk has been selling as Tesla's winning formula for years. Dojo was supposedly Tesla's 'secret sauce' for self-driving cars and humanoid robots Dojo was supposedly Tesla's 'secret sauce' for self-driving cars and humanoid robots, Gordon Johnson, founder and CEO of GLR Research, said in a note to clients. 'The system was supposed to hoover up data from Tesla's fleet and crunch it to supposedly make the algorithm smarter. Analysts even bought the hype with Morgan Stanley in 2023 slapping a $5o0 billion fantasy valuation to boost [Tesla] on Dojo's potential.' Moving forward, Tesla is expected to become more reliant on suppliers like Nvidia, AMD, and Samsung. Indeed, the automaker has already been making moves to shore up those relationships, striking a $16.5 billion deal with Samsung last month to source chips for its future EVs and robotaxis. The South Korean electronics giant is making Tesla's AI6 chips, while TMSC is expected to deliver the automakers AI5 ones in the near future. In the end, investors could end up rewarding Tesla for winding down its Dojo project and conserving its resources, especially as rising EV competition and the loss of government tax breaks continues to be a drag on the company's core business. Indeed, Tesla's stock is up over 2.5 percent in early trading Friday. The talent exodus remains a bigger problem for Tesla — especially as Musk appears to be competing against himself with xAI. Tesla's recent struggles seem to touch every corner of the company. Musk's right-wing political views have created a brand crisis that has sent many of the company's former liberal supporters running for the exits. If Tesla's top executives start to follow them, than Musk may be left running this race for AI dominance all by from this author will be added to your daily email digest and your homepage feed. See All by Andrew J. Hawkins Posts from this topic will be added to your daily email digest and your homepage feed. See All AI Posts from this topic will be added to your daily email digest and your homepage feed. See All Electric Cars Posts from this topic will be added to your daily email digest and your homepage feed. See All Elon Musk Posts from this topic will be added to your daily email digest and your homepage feed. See All Tech Posts from this topic will be added to your daily email digest and your homepage feed. See All Tesla Posts from this topic will be added to your daily email digest and your homepage feed. See All Transportation
Gizmodo
2 days ago
- Business
- Gizmodo
Tesla Reportedly Shuts Down AI Project Weeks After Musk Called It 'Spectacular'
Elon Musk has always thrived on bold claims and the contradictions that follow. On July 23, he joined Tesla's second-quarter earnings call, the standard ritual in which executives talk up their company's performance and future. Musk was in full visionary mode. That day, he painted a glowing picture of the future of Dojo, Tesla's ultra-ambitious, custom-built supercomputer designed to train the neural networks for Full Self-Driving (FSD) and Tesla's humanoid robot, Optimus. He called the next generation of Dojo 'really spectacular,' spoke of a new 'AI factory' with 'a lot of potential,' and laid out plans for Dojo 3. His tone and detail suggested Dojo was one of Tesla's most important projects, an active, thriving pillar of the company's identity as an AI leader. Less than a month later, Bloomberg dropped a bombshell: citing sources familiar with the matter, the outlet reported that Tesla had terminated its Dojo project entirely. Peter Bannon, the project's leader, was leaving the company, roughly 20 Dojo team members had recently departed for a new startup called DensityAI, and the remaining staff were being reassigned to other projects. The speed of the reversal is hard to overstate. In the space of weeks, Tesla appears to have gone from publicly championing Dojo's 'spectacular' potential to quietly dismantling the team. If Bloomberg's reporting is confirmed, it would mark the end of a program Musk once pitched as central to Tesla's technological edge. The Dojo project had already endured turbulence. It was widely seen as Tesla's attempt to reduce reliance on Nvidia's GPUs by building its own custom chips and training hardware. It was an expensive and technically risky strategy in a market dominated by chip giants. Losing talent to DensityAI, including key leaders, suggests mounting internal headwinds long before Bloomberg's scoop. On the July call, Musk fielded a question about whether his AI startup, xAI, might use Dojo. His answer was brimming with specifics and confidence. 'Dojo 2. We expect Dojo 2 to be operating at scale within the next year. At about 100 kh, 100 equivalents,' Musk said. He went on: 'And then AI Five, which is also really spectacular. I don't use those words lightly. We hope to have the AI factory in production towards the end of next year. But that has a lot of potential.' Musk even looked further ahead, discussing an 'intuitive' convergence between Dojo 3 and chips used in Tesla's cars and Optimus robots: 'Thinking about Dojo 3 and the AI six in the first chip, it seems intuitively that we want to try to find convergence there. It's basically the same chip that's used when you say two of them in a car or Optimus and maybe a larger number on a five-twelve count on a card or something like that, if you want high-bandwidth communication between chips. That seems sort of intuitively the way to go.' Critics quickly seized on the Bloomberg report to attack Musk's credibility, pointing out the contradiction between his recent hype and the reported shutdown. The Tesla community on X (formerly Twitter) lit up with debate. 'As somebody who's been invested in TSLA for over 10 years now, I'm well no stranger to his missed ambitious deadlines,' one user wrote. 'But I think his commentary on FSD, Optimus, and Dojo over the past couple of years goes beyond that. It's misleading, but he knows it needs to continue given the collapse of Tesla's car business.' Another replied: 'As somebody who's been invested in TSLA for over 10 years, taking a Bloomberg article about Tesla as entirely correct from day 1 is a bold choice. Could be true, but still bold. I suspect a specific part of Dojo has been canceled.' As somebody who's been invested in TSLA for over 10 years taking a Bloomberg article about Tesla as entirely correct on day 1 is a bold choice. Could be true, but still bold. I suspect a specific part of Dojo has been cancelled — Michael Phippen (@MichaelPhippen) August 7, 2025For longtime Musk watchers, this isn't new. In October 2015, Musk declared: 'Tesla will have a car that can do full autonomy in about three years.' Three months later, he repeated: 'We're going to end up with complete autonomy,' adding: 'And I think we will have complete autonomy in approximately two years.' Nearly a decade later, Tesla cars still aren't fully autonomous. The pattern—extreme optimism followed by abrupt course changes—is a hallmark of what's often called a 'reality distortion field,' a term first made famous in reference to Apple's Steve Jobs. Musk has wielded it to set aggressive deadlines for robotaxis, Boring Company tunnels, and humanoid robots, often without delivering on time or at scale. If Dojo has indeed been scrapped just weeks after being presented as a near-future reality, the fallout could be significant. Investors may question whether Musk knowingly misled them in July, or whether a sudden, serious issue forced him to abandon what he once described as a cornerstone of Tesla's AI strategy. Either way, if confirmed, the shutdown would deal another blow to Musk's credibility, and deepen the question of where his vision ends and reality begins. Tesla did not respond to a request for comment.
