Jeff Bezos launches Project Prometheus, a $6.2 billion AI bet on faster engineering

Jeff Bezos is taking on his first operational role since leaving Amazon in 2021. According to the New York Times, he is stepping in as co-CEO of Project Prometheus, a new AI startup backed by 6.2 billion dollars, part of which comes directly from Bezos. That amount puts the company among the best-funded early-stage startups anywhere.

He is sharing the top job with Vik Bajaj, a physicist and chemist who previously worked at Google X alongside Sergey Brin. Bajaj contributed to projects like the self-driving car that later became Waymo. He also co-founded the life sciences lab Verily and most recently led Foresite Labs before joining Project Prometheus.

How Bezos's new venture aims to reshape engineering work

According to the report, Project Prometheus is developing AI tools for engineering and manufacturing in fields like computing, automotive, and aerospace. The Times says the company has not yet decided where it will be based. Until now, the startup has operated mostly out of public view, so it is unclear when it was founded. The team already includes about 100 specialists, including researchers from OpenAI, Deepmind, and Meta.

The startup is targeting a rapidly growing and increasingly competitive segment: AI systems designed to speed up physical processes. That includes tools for robotics, scientific research, and materials development. Other companies moving into this space include Periodic Labs, which is building a lab where robots can run scientific experiments at scale. By analyzing those experiments, AI models are supposed to learn how to carry out much of the work autonomously.