AMD to Acquire World Labs in $8.2 Billion Deal to Advance AI Compute

AMD has announced a definitive agreement to acquire World Labs, an artificial intelligence research company co-founded and led by AI pioneer Dr. Fei-Fei Li.

The all-stock transaction is valued at approximately US$8.2 billion and is expected to be completed by the end of 2026, subject to regulatory approval and other customary closing conditions.

The acquisition will bring World Labs’ AI researchers and model-development expertise into AMD, supporting the company’s efforts to develop future AI hardware, software and computing systems around emerging AI workloads.

Building Infrastructure for the Next Generation of AI

As AI expands beyond traditional applications into areas such as reasoning, robotics, simulation and physical AI, computing requirements are becoming increasingly diverse.

AMD says World Labs’ experience in advanced AI models will provide deeper insight into how these workloads are evolving. This could help AMD shape its future technology roadmap and develop infrastructure designed for an increasingly broad range of AI applications.

AMD CEO Dr. Lisa Su said the combination of World Labs’ model expertise and AMD’s computing capabilities will help build platforms for the next generation of AI while supporting an open AI ecosystem.

World Labs CEO Dr. Fei-Fei Li added that joining AMD will give the research team greater access to engineering resources and infrastructure to accelerate its work on future AI technologies.

World Labs to Continue AI Model Research

Based in San Francisco, World Labs focuses on spatial intelligence, developing AI models capable of generating, reconstructing and simulating interactive 3D environments from text, images and video.

The company also works on technologies related to robotic learning and simulation, areas that could become increasingly important as AI moves into physical-world applications.

Following the completion of the acquisition, the World Labs team will continue its AI model research within AMD. Dr. Fei-Fei Li will join AMD as Executive Vice President and Chief Scientist, reporting directly to Dr. Lisa Su.

The acquisition represents another major step in AMD’s strategy to expand its AI capabilities by bringing together computing infrastructure and advanced model research.