Poolside

Frontier coding and software-engineering models built from scratch, using a 'Model Factory' pipeline; a small team (fewer than 70 people built its model, per CEO). Started as a coding agent, moved into data centers, then released its own open model.

Founded

2023

Founders

Jason Warner, Eiso Kant

Pushes against

Relying on a large, general-purpose frontier lab's model for coding.

Now

Nvidia licensed the Model Factory software non-exclusively for $6B, offered jobs to 109 staff and invested $1B. A letter to investors says it is 'not an acquisition'. The reported goal is Nvidia open-weights models. Founders stay.

Key people

• Eiso Kant (co-founder, co-CEO)
• Jason Warner (co-founder)

Funding

• 21 August 2026

  Amount

  $6B Nvidia licence fee plus $1B Nvidia investment

  Valuation

  $12B pre-money

  Lead

  Nvidia

  Source thenextweb.com

Every funding round in the atlas

Sources

1. thenextweb.com/news/nvidia-poolside-6bn-model-factory-licence
2. the-decoder.com/nvidia-is-acquiring-poolsides-model-factory-and-109-employees-for-6-billio
3. runtimewire.com/article/nvidia-pays-6b-to-license-poolside-s-factory-for-u-s-open-weight-m
4. latent.space/p/poolside

This profile was checked and corrected against its sources on 6 October 2026. How we check