Previously known as Holistic, H was established by pioneers from Google’s DeepMind AI lab. The company aims to empower businesses with its innovative AI solutions, and its first offering is an AI agent tailored for professionals and developers engaged in business process outsourcing, quality assurance, and robotic process automation.

AI Agents Revolutionizing Business

The newly launched AI agent is designed to go beyond mere information processing; it is capable of planning, executing tasks, and solving problems autonomously. H’s CEO, Charles Kantor, emphasized this vision, stating, ‘This is about empowering people to harness AI like never before. Runner H allows users to automate workflows, streamline tasks, and own the web.’ As announced on the company’s blog, the product is currently available for testing, marking a significant milestone in H’s journey.

H is not alone in the race to develop capable AI agents; tech giants like Microsoft and Anthropic are also making strides in this field. Nevertheless, H claims that its compact AI model has outperformed notable competitors based on WebVoyager benchmarks.

The Team Behind the Innovation

Founded in late 2023, H comprises a talented team, including Stanford researcher Kantor, alongside former Google DeepMind alumnus Laurent Sifre serving as the Chief Technological Officer. The initial team also included DeepMind veterans Karl Tuyls, Daan Wierstra, and Julien Perolat, who departed last year due to ‘operational differences.’ Currently, H employs around 50 staff members situated in Paris and London.

H distinguishes itself through its approach to large language models (LLMs). While it operates with about 2 billion parameters, significantly fewer than competitors like ChatGPT 3, which boasts 175 billion, this design choice renders H’s technology more cost-effective for organizations.

Backing and Investment

Significantly, H has secured substantial backing from industry luminaries, including LVMH’s CEO Bernard Arnault, Iliad founder Xavier Niel, Amazon, Samsung, and former Google CEO Eric Schmidt. Remarkably, before the official launch of its products, the startup raised $220 million (€210 million) in investment funding.