Global giant Microsoft has appointed the two co-founders of London-based Haiper AI.
Dr Yishu Miao and Dr Ziyu Wang, who founded the generative AI video platform, have both changed their occupations on LinkedIn.
According to their profiles on the site, they have both left the startup that they founded in 2021 to become members of Microsoft’s technical staff.
Miao’s bio now also reads: “After 3 years startup life with Haiper, I’m starting a new journey at Microsoft AI building multimodal generative AI!”
On Companies House, however, the pair are still listed as active directors of the business.
In March last year, it was announced that the firm had raised a £10.8m seed round led by Octopus Ventures, bringing its total funding at the time to £15.1m.
The firm had also planned to raise a Series A round before the end of that year.
Haiper’s latest published accounts showed that its cash position was £3.5m as of 31st July 2024. Its cash position a year earlier was £10.9m.
Prior to launching Haiper, Miao founded and led Oxford-based startup MO Intelligence and also worked as a tech lead manager at social media giant TikTok.
Wang had served as a staff research scientist at Google Brain and both had spent time working at DeepMind as well as gaining PhDs from Oxford University in machine learning.
After her company led the round last year, Rebecca Hunt, then partner at Octopus Ventures, said: “The deeply technical foundations of Haiper have enabled them to innovate and make breakthroughs at a pace we haven’t yet seen in the AI video space; they are sure to become one of Europe’s big AI players.
“We look forward to continuing to back Yishu and Ziyu on their world-changing mission.”
Hunt resigned as a director of the business on 28th October 2024, according to Companies House, while her LinkedIn profile claims the directorship ended in January 2025, when she left Octopus Ventures.
BusinessCloud has contacted Haiper for further clarification.
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