When was Sakana founded?

Sakana was founded in 2023 and become a unicorn in its 1st funding round in 2024.

Where is Sakana located?

Sakana is headquartered in Tokyo, Japan.

Who is the current CEO of Sakana?

David Ha of Sakana. They have also founded 1 company.

How many employees does Sakana have?

As of Apr 30, 2026, the latest employee count at Sakana is 193.

Is Sakana a funded company?

Sakana is a funded company, having raised a total of $379M across 7 funding rounds to date. The company's 1st funding round was a $30M Seed round, raised on Jan 16, 2024.

How much is Sakana worth?

The latest valuation of Sakana is $2.65B as of Nov 17, 2025.

When was the latest funding round of Sakana?

Sakana's latest funding was a Series B round on Mar 25, 2026, with participation from 1 investor.

Is Sakana a AI Infrastructure company?

The primary sectors of Sakana are AI Infrastructure and Artificial Intelligence.

Where does Sakana rank among its competitors?

Sakana ranks 5th amongst 161 active competitors, of which 43 are funded. It stands 10th in terms of total funding among its competitors. The most recent competitor to raise funding was OpenAI, which secured $75M in Apr, 2026.

Who are the top competitors of Sakana?

Sakana's top competitors include OpenAI, Mistral AI and Anthropic. Among them, OpenAI secured the most recent funding round in April, 2026.

Sakana - 2026 Company Profile, Team, Funding & Competitors

Sakana is a series B company based in Tokyo (Japan), founded in 2023 by Alex Yu, David Ha and Llion Jones. It operates as a Provider of AI research laboratory services. Sakana has raised $379M in funding from investors like Khosla Ventures, Lux Capital and New Enterprise Associates, with a current valuation of $2.65B. The company has 161 active competitors, including 43 funded and 7 that have exited. Its top competitors include companies like OpenAI, Mistral AI and Anthropic.

Sectors and market segments that Sakana operate in

Sakana serves in the High Tech, Native AI market segments.The primary business model of Sakana are:

Company Details

Sakana AI is a Tokyo-based R&D company founded by former Google AI engineers, David Ha and Llion Jones. Inspired by nature, Sakana AI aims to design collective artificial intelligence models.

Website: sakana.ai
Social
Email ID: *****@sakana.ai

Key Metrics

Founded Year

2023

Location

Tokyo, Japan

Stage

Series B

Total Funding

$379M in 7 rounds

Latest Funding Round

Series B, Mar 25, 2026, Undisclosed

Post Money Valuation

$2.65B as on Nov 17, 2025

Investors

Khosla Ventures & 29 more

Ranked

5^th among 161 active competitors

Employee Count

193 as on Apr 30, 2026

Similar Companies

OpenAI & 261 more

View Sakana's full profile

Sakana has raised a total funding of $379M over 7 rounds. Its first funding round was on Jan 16, 2024. Its latest funding round was a Series B round on Mar 25, 2026 for an undisclosed amount. 1 investor participated in its latest round. Sakana has 28 institutional investors and 2 angel investors.

Here is the list of recent funding rounds of Sakana:

Filter this list

Date of Funding	Funding Amount	Round Name	Post-Money Valuation	Revenue Multiple	Lead Investors	Other Investors
Mar 25, 2026	Undisclosed	Series B	-	-	-	Mitsubishielectric
Feb 25, 2026	Undisclosed	Series B	-	-	-	Citi
Jan 23, 2026	Undisclosed	Series B	-	-	-	Google

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View details of Sakana's funding rounds and investors

The founders of Sakana are Alex Yu, David Ha and Llion Jones. David Ha is the CEO of Sakana.

Here are the details of Sakana's key team members:

Alex Yu: Co-Founder & COO of Sakana.
David Ha: Co-Founder & CEO of Sakana.
Contact Info: 1 email address
Llion Jones: Co-Founder of Sakana.
Contact Info: 1 email address

View details of Sakana's Founder profiles and Board Members

Sakana's employee count trend

Sakana has 193 employees as of Apr 26. Here is Sakana's employee count trend over the years:

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Top competitors of Sakana include OpenAI, Mistral AI and Anthropic. Here is the list of Top 10 competitors of Sakana, ranked by Tracxn score:

Rank	Company Details	Short Description	Total Funding	Investors	Tracxn Score
1st	OpenAI 2015, San Francisco (United States), Series G	Developer of artificial intelligence models tools and research-driven platforms	$180B	Microsoft, SoftBank Group & 70 others	89/100
2nd	Mistral AI 2023, Paris (France), Series C	Developer of frontier AI models, assistants, agents, and related services	$3.05B	Lightspeed Venture Partners, General Catalyst ... & 46 others	83/100
3rd	Anthropic 2021, San Francisco (United States), Series G	Platform offering conversational chatbot and research services	$72.3B	GIC, Amazon & 90 others	82/100
4th	Cohere 2019, Toronto (Canada), Series D	Developer of enterprise AI platform and multilingual language and retrieval models	$1.54B	Inovia Capital, Sapphire Ventures & 31 others	77/100
5th	Sakana 2023, Tokyo (Japan), Series B	Provider of AI research laboratory services	$379M	Geodesic Capital, In-Q-Tel & 28 others	71/100
6th	xAI 2023, Palo Alto (United States), Acquired	Platform providing AI-powered assistant for image generation and trend analysis	$45B	Kingdom Holding Company, Qatar Investment Authority ... & 46 others	71/100
7th	AI21 Labs 2017, Tel Aviv (Israel), Series D	Platform offering AI focused writing and reading assistants	$636M	Pitango, Walden Catalyst & 14 others	66/100
8th	Aleph Alpha 2019, Heidelberg (Germany), Acquired	Provider of an AI-enabled text and image analytics platform	$533M	Gruppe, Sapphire Ventures & 23 others	66/100
9th	Zhipu 2021, Haidian (China), Public	AI powered code generation tool for developers	$1.4B	Alibaba Group, Tencent & 12 others	66/100
10th	ReflectionAI 2025, New York City (United States), Series B	Developer of autonomous coding systems	$2.13B	CRV, Lightspeed Venture Partners & 18 others	65/100