World Labs, the artificial intelligence start-up founded by computer scientist Fei-Fei Li, raised $1bn in new funding, it announced in a blog post on 18 February 2026.
The company named AMD, Autodesk, Emerson Collective, Fidelity Management & Research Company, NVIDIA and Sea among its investors, and said others had also taken part. The Decoder reported that Andreessen Horowitz was also named as an investor. World Labs did not name a lead investor or say which series the round was.
Autodesk invested $200m and will serve as an adviser to the start-up, Reuters reported. World Labs did not disclose its valuation. Bloomberg News had reported in January that the company was in funding talks at a valuation of about $5bn, according to Reuters.
What World Labs does
World Labs builds what it calls world models: AI systems designed to perceive, generate and interact with three-dimensional environments, an ability Li calls spatial intelligence. Reuters described spatial intelligence as the ability to reason about how the 3D world works, rather than relying on two-dimensional data such as flat images or text.
Its first product, Marble, creates 3D worlds from images, video or text. World Labs says the worlds Marble produces are spatially consistent and persistent, so users can explore them rather than just view a single generated image. The Decoder reported that Marble launched in late 2025.
Li, whom Reuters described as widely known as the "godmother of AI", is known for her work on ImageNet, the image dataset that underpinned much of the progress in computer vision, The Decoder noted. The company says its aim is to advance spatial intelligence by building world models.
What the money is for
World Labs said the funding would accelerate its work on world models for storytelling, creativity, robotics and scientific discovery. The Decoder reported that the company plans to expand into robotics and science applications, beyond the creative tools it has focused on so far.
Li has said that spatial intelligence models could be used in augmented and virtual reality and in robotics, Reuters reported. The company did not give a breakdown of how it would spend the money.
Who invested
The investor list combines chipmakers, a software company and financial investors. AMD and NVIDIA both make the processors used to train and run AI models. Autodesk, whose software is used in design, engineering and media, is exploring integrating World Labs' models into its products, Reuters reported. Emerson Collective, Fidelity and Sea are also among the backers.
The reports differ on where the Autodesk figure came from: Reuters reported the $200m investment and advisory role directly, while The Decoder attributed the amount to Bloomberg. Neither World Labs nor its investors disclosed the size of the other contributions.
The round is a large step up from the company's launch funding. Li raised $230m in September 2024 when she launched World Labs, according to Reuters.
Company website: worldlabs.ai