Enter BentoML
In the fast-paced realm of artificial intelligence, BentoML is making significant strides. The AI development framework, founded by Chaoyu Yang, an early software engineer at data mega-unicorn Databricks, has recently secured a whopping $9M in seed funding, paving the way for a revolution in AI app development.
BentoML Paves the Way for Simplified AI Development
As Yang expressed in a recent interview with TechCrunch, the success of large language models like GPT has ignited a frenzy of developers eager to craft AI-powered applications. However, the AI sector is grappling with a shortage of skilled developers to meet the skyrocketing demand. That’s where BentoML steps in.
Streamlining AI Services
Today’s AI services are often underpinned by multiple machine learning models, which can complicate their management and operation. Many new entrants to this sphere are full-stack or application developers, who might find themselves at a disadvantage due to their lack of AI-specific skills. This often results in protracted development processes. BentoML, however, provides a high-level API that abstracts the intricate details of AI infrastructure, simplifying the process of running AI models on the cloud.
Democratizing AI Application Development
BentoML’s primary objective is to democratize AI app development. The company targets data scientists who train AI models, DevOp engineers who manage their lifecycle, and developers who build applications on top of the models. A case in point is the Microsoft’s Visual ChatGPT application. Yang revealed that with BentoML, developers can make Visual ChatGPT scalable and cost-efficient for production use in as short as two days.
The BentoML Journey
BentoML’s journey began in 2019 when it was open-sourced and later introduced a self-hosted SaaS version for enterprise customers. Its open-source community has quadrupled in the past year to over 3,000 members, with notable early adopters like Japanese messaging giant Line and South Korean internet conglomerate Naver. Reflecting its growing traction, BentoML recently secured $9M in its seed financing round led by DCM Ventures and Bow Capital.
Balancing Short- and Long-term Goals
Despite the promising growth, navigating the dynamic AI market isn’t without its challenges.
“You might have to build things that ride the current trend, but in the long term, we of course want to have our own moat. The question is how we balance our time and human resources between the two,” Yang admitted.
BentoML’s recent success in securing $9M funding signifies a promising leap towards accelerating AI app development. As the company continues to evolve and adapt to the ever-changing AI landscape, it’s exciting to see how this will influence the broader AI application development field.
What are your thoughts on BentoML’s recent success and its impact on the future of AI? We’d love to hear your thoughts in the comments below!
