Pantera Capital, Binance Labs, and Polychain Capital led funding to support the launch of Sahara AI’s blockchain platform, promoting AI sovereignty and provenance, and providing secure control and protection of AI assets for individuals and businesses
Sahara AI, a decentralized blockchain platform built for open and equitable AI, announced $43 million in total funding, led by Pantera Capital, Binance Labs, and Polychain Capital. The round included participation from Samsung NEXT, Matrix Partners, dao5, Geekcartel, Nomad Capital, SCB 10X, Canonical Capital, Mirana Ventures, Foresight Ventures, Dispersion Capital, Aegis Ventures, Alumni Ventures, and Tangent Ventures, among others.
Sahara AI has also partnered with strategic angels and advisors from the AI industry and academia including Laksh Vaaman Sehgal (Vice Chairman, Motherson Group), Rohan Taori (Research Scientist, Anthropic), Teknium (Co-founder, Nous Research), Vipul Prakash (CEO, Together AI), and Elvis Zhang (Founding Member, Midjourney).
This new capital will allow Sahara Labs to expand its global team of experts, enhance the performance of its AI blockchain, and grow its developer ecosystem.
Ethical concerns over copyright, privacy, resource access, and economic imbalances continue to grow as AI becomes more widely adopted and capable. Stakeholders, including users, data contributors, model creators, and application builders, are seeking solutions to secure ownership and receive fair compensation for their contributions. To empower everyone to shape and own the future of AI, Sahara Labs is launching a blockchain-based AI platform that offers users and developers secure control and “copyright” protection over their AI assets, including proprietary data, models, and agents. This platform fosters an open, transparent, and inclusive AI economy where all participants are fairly attributed and compensated for their input.
“At Pantera, we believe in the future of decentralized AI, offering opportunities for personalized products to be built without centralized oversight,” said Lauren Stephanian, General Partner of Pantera Capital. “Sahara AI’s platform is designed to meet these challenges, providing an ethically designed and universally accessible infrastructure that enables individuals and enterprises to leverage AI’s full potential without compromising on privacy or sovereignty. We are excited to support Sean, Tyler and the rest of the team as they build towards this new collaborative AI economy.”
“Binance Labs is dedicated to empowering founders in Web3 who have the potential to build innovative tech solutions and create sustainable, lasting impact. We look forward to backing Sahara AI as they pioneer a decentralized AI blockchain platform, reshaping the future of AI to be more transparent, secure, and accessible for everyone,” said Yi He, Co-Founder of Binance and Head of Binance Labs.
Since its founding in April 2023 by USC Professor and Viterbi Early Career Chair Sean Ren and former Binance Labs investment director Tyler Zhou, Sahara AI has grown exponentially, and is now trusted by over 35 leading tech innovators and research institutions, including Microsoft, Amazon, MIT, Motherson Group, and Snap.
“Since our inception, our goal has been to create a future where AI is ethical, transparent, and accessible to all through AI sovereignty and open technology,” said Sean Ren, co-founder of Sahara Labs—the driving force contributing to Sahara AI. “With the help of our notable investors and partners, this latest funding is a testament to why it is necessary to establish a robust, decentralized provenance infrastructure within today’s rapidly evolving AI-first world.”
