Inherent launches with $50 million to rethink AI-native science

Inherent has emerged from stealth with a $50 million seed round led by Index Ventures and Radical Ventures. The London-based public benefit corporation is building AI agents intended to discover new knowledge rather than only answer well-specified questions.

The lab describes its broader experiment as a recursively self-improving research organization: its AI systems, compute infrastructure, human teams, and research process are meant to improve one another. Its agenda includes machine “taste” for promising scientific hypotheses, new forms of human-machine collaboration, and maintaining human agency as research systems become more capable.

Inherent was founded by Tantum Collins, Edward Hughes, Louis Kirsch, and Kaloyan Aleksiev. Collins, Hughes, and Kirsch previously worked at Google DeepMind; Aleksiev previously worked at Reka AI and Microsoft. Collins is CEO, after earlier roles spanning DeepMind research and technology and national-security policy at the White House.

The round also included NVentures, Ex/Ante, Metaplanet, Macroscopic Ventures, Mythos Ventures, and a group of individual AI researchers and operators. Matt Clifford advises the company.