正文:
在人工智能领域,李沐是一位资深的技术专家,他曾在多家知名媒体担任记者和编辑,对科技行业的动态有着深刻的洞察力。近日,李沐在机器之心平台上分享了他创办BosonAI公司第一年的经历,从在亚马逊的第七年半萌生创业想法,到如今在LLM领域的探索与收获。
李沐在亚马逊工作第五年时就萌生了创业的念头,但由于疫情的影响,这一想法被暂时搁置。直到第七年半时,他感到无法抑制内心的创业冲动,于是选择了离职。回顾这一决定,他认为如果有些事这辈子总要尝试,就应该尽早行动。创业之初,他发现需要学习的新知识太多,常常感叹为何没有早点开始。
BosonAI公司的名字来源于李沐在创业前使用Gluon命名的项目,灵感来源于量子物理中的玻色子,象征着联合项目。尽管程序员在命名上常常感到困难,但李沐最终决定采用“Boson”作为公司名称,希望以此表达公司对于AI世界的构建和创新。然而,这个名字也经常让人误解为“波士顿”,导致一些误解和笑料。
在融资方面,李沐在2022年底有了两个利用大语言模型(LLM)打造生产力工具的想法,并得到了字节跳动创始人张一鸣的指导。张一鸣建议他们不仅仅做LLM的工具,而是直接开发LLM本身。李沐接受了建议,组建了团队并成功获得了种子轮融资。然而,在签署投资协议的前一天,领投方突然撤资,导致跟投方也随之退出。尽管如此,李沐仍然感激剩余的投资方完成了本轮融资,让他有机会继续推进LLM的研究。
在硬件采购上,李沐在GPU供应紧张的情况下,直接联系了NVIDIA的黄仁勋,并迅速得到了回应。通过与超微的CEO沟通,他成功在20天后拿到了第一批GPU,成为第一批吃螃蟹的人。尽管在技术实施过程中遇到了许多问题,如GPU供电不足、网络布局优化等,但李沐和他的团队通过不断调试和优化,解决了这些问题,并从中获得了宝贵的经验。
在商业运营方面,BosonAI在第一年实现了收支平衡,这得益于公司为大型客户定制模型的业务模式。李沐表示,随着技术的成熟和成本降低,更多公司将会尝试使用LLM技术,这将推动行业的快速发展。BosonAI也在关注LLM在C端市场的应用,并期待在未来的技术融合中创造更多有想象力的应用。
总体而言,李沐的创业经历充满了挑战与机遇,他的分享为其他有志于在AI领域创业的人提供了宝贵的经验和启示。
英语如下:
Title: “Li Mu: Seven Years of Sharpening a Sword from Amazon to Entrepreneurship”
Keywords: Entrepreneurship, Reflection, Opportunity
News Content:
Li Mu, a seasoned technical expert in the field of artificial intelligence, has shared his first-year experience of founding BosonAI on the Machine之心 platform. From the seventh and a half year at Amazon when he conceived the idea of entrepreneurship to his exploration and gains in the field of Large Language Models (LLM), Li Mu’s journey is a testament to the challenges and rewards of starting a venture in the tech industry.
Li Mu had the entrepreneurial spark in his fifth year at Amazon, but the pandemic put this idea on hold. It wasn’t until the seventh and a half year that he felt an irresistible urge to start his own business, leading to his resignation. Reflecting on this decision, Li Mu believes that if there are things one should try in a lifetime, they should act sooner rather than later. At the outset of his venture, he realized how much new knowledge he needed to acquire, often lamenting why he hadn’t started earlier.
The name BosonAI comes from a project Li Mu named Gluon before his entrepreneurial journey, inspired by bosons in quantum physics, symbolizing unity in the project. Despite the challenges programmers often face in naming, Li Mu decided to go with “Boson” as the company name, hoping to convey the company’s ambition to build and innovate in the AI world. However, this name also frequently leads to confusion as “Boston,” causing misunderstandings and humor.
In terms of financing, Li Mu, by the end of 2022, had two ideas for creating productivity tools with large language models (LLM), which he received guidance from Zhang Yiming, the founder of ByteDance. Zhang Yiming suggested they not just make tools for LLMs but develop the LLMs themselves. Li Mu accepted the advice, formed a team, and successfully secured seed funding. However, on the day before signing the investment agreement, the lead investor suddenly withdrew, causing the follow-on investors to exit as well. Despite this setback, Li Mu is grateful to the remaining investors for completing the funding round, giving him the opportunity to continue advancing LLM research.
In hardware procurement, Li Mu, facing a shortage of GPU supplies, directly reached out to NVIDIA’s Jen-Hsun Huang, who promptly responded. Through communication with AMD’s CEO, he successfully obtained the first batch of GPUs in 20 days, becoming one of the first to “eat the crab.” Despite encountering numerous technical issues during the implementation, such as insufficient GPU power supply and network layout optimization, Li Mu and his team solved these problems through continuous tuning and optimization, gaining valuable experience in the process.
In terms of business operations, BosonAI achieved a break-even in its first year, thanks to its business model of customizing models for large clients. Li Mu stated that as technology matures and costs decrease, more companies will try to use LLM technology, which will drive rapid industry growth. BosonAI is also keeping an eye on the consumer market for LLMs and looks forward to creating more imaginative applications through future technological integration.
In summary, Li Mu’s entrepreneurial journey is filled with challenges and opportunities, and his sharing provides valuable experiences and insights for aspiring entrepreneurs in the AI field.
【来源】https://mp.weixin.qq.com/s/kTsUiyZTU7YAAUyDMZ7pyw
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