Andrej Karpathy
About Andrej Karpathy
Andrej Karpathy is a Slovak-Canadian AI researcher with a PhD from Stanford, where he taught deep learning for computer vision until 2015. He then left to help start OpenAI as a founding research scientist.
In 2017 he became Director of AI at Tesla and led the computer vision team for Autopilot. He left Tesla in 2022. In February 2023 he announced he was returning to OpenAI, and in February 2024 an OpenAI spokesperson confirmed he had left again.
On July 16, 2024 he announced Eureka Labs, an AI education company whose first product is the LLM101n course. In May 2026 CNBC reported that he is joining Anthropic's pretraining team. He is based in Palo Alto.
Crunchbase counts at least 21 investments by Karpathy, with 0 lead investments, 0 exits and 0 companies founded. He invests as an individual angel, not through a fund, and he does not appear as a lead in the rounds Crunchbase tracks.
Tracxn dates his earliest tracked investment to Adept's Series A in April 2022. Crunchbase's activity timeline then shows rounds with his participation from October 2023 onward, including Class Companion (October 2023) and Lutra AI (December 2023). Crunchbase counts 18 AI investments since 2023. Dealroom, a separate data provider, lists 16 to 17 directly backed companies, so counts differ by source.
Most of his recorded investments are in AI companies, and they span several layers of the stack. Examples include search and answer engines (Perplexity), diffusion language models (Inception), world models and real-time generative video (World Labs, Decart, Pika), compute and chips (Lambda, Etched, MatX), and decentralized model training (Prime Intellect).
He has also backed agent and application companies such as Lutra AI, Adept and /dev/agents, plus newer research-oriented companies such as Standard Intelligence and Flapping Airplanes.
Recent rounds with his participation include Prime Intellect (Series A, early 2025), Inception (seed, November 2025), Flapping Airplanes (seed, January 2026) and Simile (Series A, February 2026). He also took part in Standard Intelligence's Series A (April 2026) and Decart's Series C (May 2026).
Dealroom's analysis of his history shows the first priced round he joined was a Series A for 7 companies, a seed for 6 and Series B or later for 3. He is therefore not only a pre-seed or seed investor. His portfolio is concentrated in the United States, with one company each in Canada and India. By sector, Dealroom classifies 11 of 16 companies as enterprise software, followed by media, marketing, education, health, hosting and semiconductors.
The sources reviewed do not include a public statement from Karpathy on his check size or his investment criteria. Third-party figures are not verified, so treat them with caution. Founders should read his public writing and talks on X and karpathy.ai to see the technical themes he cares about.
- Perplexity: AI answer engine. Karpathy appears in rounds tracked by Crunchbase in 2024 and by Tracxn as a Series C participant in August 2024.
- Adept: AI agent company. Tracxn lists his participation in the April 2022 Series A.
- Inception: Diffusion-based language model company. He took part in its seed round, announced in November 2025.
- Prime Intellect: Decentralized AI training company. He took part in its Series A in early 2025.
- Lambda: AI cloud and GPU infrastructure company. He appears in its Series D, February 2025.
- Decart: Real-time generative video and media company. He took part in its Series C, May 2026.
- Standard Intelligence: AI research company. He took part in its Series A, announced in April 2026.
- Flapping Airplanes: AI research company. He took part in its seed round, January 2026.
- Lutra AI: AI agent company. He took part in its December 2023 round.
- World Labs: Spatial intelligence and world model company. He appears in its September 2024 round.
- Simile: AI company that raised a Series A in February 2026, with Karpathy listed as an investor.
- Pika, Replicate, Brain Co., MatX and Etched: also appear in his Crunchbase or Dealroom portfolio.
- crunchbase.com/person/f88fffe4-06f9-4f6d-8680-3e6bdf7d7d6e
- crunchbase.com/person/andrej-karpathy-7d6e
- crunchbase.com/person/andrej-karpathy-7d6e/person_overview_investor/ti
- dealroom.co/investors/andrej-karpathy
- tracxn.com/d/people/andrej-karpathy/__J3dbJmbDRGaub7JbNAtEIe0JdrQpdkAj
- tracxn.com/d/people/andrej-karpathy/__uB8TMWoEjcm1uEf-5N_bCQWxWcsSurPM
- cnbc.com/2026/05/19/anthropic-hires-openai-cofounder-andrej-karpathy-f
- techcrunch.com/2024/07/16/after-tesla-and-openai-andrej-karpathys-star
AI portfolio
Investing activity
Andrej Karpathy has made 21 investments according to Crunchbase. 18 of those investments since 2023 were in AI companies, including Inception, Lutra AI, Perplexity, Prime Intellect and World Labs.
Andrej Karpathy appears in 2 AI deals tracked by the Lounge deals desk, rounds totalling $278M. The rounds are mostly Seed, with a median round size of $180M. The most recent are Engram (Seed, $98M, Jun 2026) and Flapping Airplanes (Seed, $180M, Jan 2026).
Andrej Karpathy most often invests alongside Sequoia Capital, Chris Re, General Catalyst and Kleiner Perkins, and the companies they back on Lounge are mostly in AI and AI research lab.
Deals
Frequently asked questions about Andrej Karpathy
Does Andrej Karpathy invest in AI startups?
Yes. Crunchbase counts 18 AI investments by him since 2023, including Perplexity, Inception, Prime Intellect, World Labs, Decart and Lambda.
What is Andrej Karpathy's angel check size?
It is not public. None of the sources reviewed give a check size, and he is not recorded as leading any rounds.
What stage does Andrej Karpathy invest in?
Dealroom shows he has joined seed rounds, Series A rounds and later rounds. Of his tracked companies, 7 were first backed at Series A, 6 at seed and 3 at Series B or later.
What companies has Andrej Karpathy invested in?
They include Perplexity, Adept, Lutra AI, Inception, Prime Intellect, Lambda, Decart, World Labs, Pika, Standard Intelligence, Flapping Airplanes and Simile.
What is Andrej Karpathy doing now?
CNBC reported in May 2026 that he is joining Anthropic's pretraining team. Before that he ran Eureka Labs, the AI education company he founded in 2024.
How can founders contact Andrej Karpathy?
He is active on X as @karpathy and publishes on karpathy.ai. No public pitch process or investor contact is documented in the sources reviewed.
Is Andrej Karpathy an angel investor?
Yes. Andrej Karpathy invests personally as an angel. Crunchbase counts 21 investments.
What AI companies has Andrej Karpathy invested in?
Andrej Karpathy's AI investments include Inception, Lutra AI, Perplexity, Prime Intellect, World Labs, Decart, Lambda and Standard Intelligence. The 2 rounds on Lounge are listed on this page with amounts, dates and co-investors.
Where is Andrej Karpathy based?
Andrej Karpathy is based in Palo Alto, United States.
What stage does Andrej Karpathy invest at?
In the rounds tracked on Lounge, Andrej Karpathy has invested at Seed, with a median round of $180M.