Runway, a startup located in New York, has secured $308 million in fresh funding, elevating its valuation to around $3 billion. This investment will aid in the growth of its film and animation studio.
The Series D funding round was spearheaded by General Atlantic, with significant contributions from prominent investors such as Fidelity, Baillie Gifford, NVIDIA, SoftBank, and others. With this latest round, Runway’s total funding has reached $545 million, up from its earlier valuation of $1.5 billion.
Founded in 2018, Runway focuses on generative AI tools for video and media production.
“Runway begins its next chapter. With Gen-4 and other upcoming updates in our roadmap, it’s clear that we are entering a completely new media ecosystem,” said Runway CEO Cristóbal Valenzuela on X on the recent fundraise. “We believe AI can become a reliable world simulator, and when you can simulate anything and everything, the media and the stories we create and consume will be forever changed.”
Runway has launched Gen-4, an advanced AI video model capable of creating videos from just one reference image. This new version offers improved clarity, more lifelike motion, and better adherence to prompts compared to Gen-3 Alpha.
Gen-4 features world consistency, allowing for the same environments, characters, and objects to remain consistent throughout different scenes, making it perfect for long-form content that requires continuity. Users can guide subjects, regenerate elements from various perspectives, and maintain a uniform visual style.
In the previous year, Runway collaborated with Lionsgate to create a specialized AI model trained on the studio’s film and television library, with the goal of lowering production expenses.
This partnership established a new benchmark in the entertainment sector, placing Runway ahead of rivals such as OpenAI’s Sora. In December of the previous year, OpenAI introduced its highly anticipated video-generation model, Sora, which the company claims is a strategic move towards realizing artificial general intelligence (AGI).
Runway also organizes its own AI Film Festival, akin to the one in Cannes, aimed at honoring artists who incorporate emerging AI technologies into their short films. Launched three years ago, the festival seeks to foster discussions about the inevitable integration of AI tools in the film industry and to connect with creators from diverse backgrounds to gain insights into their viewpoints.
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