Two of DeepMind’s three co-founders are reportedly creating an investment network of ‘super angels’ to back European start-ups.
The Sunday Times reports that CEO Demis Hassabis and head of applied artificial intelligence Mustafa Suleyman are planning for the network, made up of celebrities, to begin investing later this year.
The paper said there is to be a particular focus on backing those focusing on “deep technology”.
London-based DeepMind Technologies was founded in the UK in 2011 by Suleyman, Hassabis and Shane Legg and bought and renamed by Google in 2014.
The AI research lab has since partnered with the NHS to see if its machine learning technology can be used to treat head and neck cancers as well as on other projects in the capital.
It has also bought out three start-ups of its own: Oxford University spinouts Dark Blue Labs and Vision Factory and Imperial College London start-up Hark.
Suleyman and Hassabis have themselves invested in clothing company Thread, music ticketing app Dice and healthcare start-up Babylon.
Hassabis was featured in BusinessCloud’s Tech 100 Rich List.
DeepMind chose not to comment on the report.