Periodic

Seed

From bits to atoms

AI scientists and autonomous robotic laboratories that accelerate the discovery of new materials.

Founded May 2025San Francisco, CA~30 people$300M raisedFeatured at Seed

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AiMaterials ScienceDeep TechRoboticsLab AutomationComputational ChemistrySuperconductors

About

Periodic Labs fuses frontier AI models, physics-based simulations, and autonomous robotic laboratories into a closed-loop system where AI scientists generate hypotheses, design experiments, and learn from real-world outcomes. Founded by former OpenAI VP Liam Fedus (co-creator of ChatGPT) and former Google DeepMind materials science lead Ekin Dogus Cubuk (co-author of GNoME, which discovered 2.2M new crystals), the company aims to compress materials R&D timelines from decades into months. Their initial moonshot is discovering high-temperature superconductors. The company operates powder synthesis labs where robots mix precursors, apply heat, characterize properties, and generate gigabytes of proprietary experimental data — including negative results — creating a compounding data moat that cannot be replicated.

DailyDropout Take

Periodic represents the rare convergence of elite AI talent and hard science — a ChatGPT co-creator and a GNoME co-author building autonomous labs that generate proprietary physical data no LLM can scrape. With $300M and a Nobel laureate advisory board, they're positioned to define the next era of materials discovery.

Discovery signal: Unusual founding team pedigree (OpenAI VP + DeepMind materials lead), record seed round size, Nobel laureate advisory board

What Makes Them Unique

Periodic operates both a frontier AI lab and a frontier physical science lab in a closed loop — robots run real experiments, generating proprietary data (including failures) that cannot be scraped from the internet, creating a compounding data moat no competitor can replicate.

$300M

Seed Round

~$1B

Valuation

~30 people

Team

Target Markets

SemiconductorsDefenseSpace / AerospaceEnergyQuantum Computing

Founders

Liam Fedus

Co-Founder & CEO

Former VP of Post-Training Research at OpenAI and co-creator of ChatGPT. Led the team behind the first trillion-parameter neural network. PhD from Universite de Montreal / MILA.

LinkedIn 𝕏Twitter

Ekin Dogus Cubuk

Co-Founder

Former Head of Materials Science and Chemistry Research at Google DeepMind. Co-authored GNoME, which discovered 2.2 million new crystals. PhD in Materials and Condensed Matter Physics from Harvard.

LinkedIn 𝕏Twitter

Key People

Alexandre PassosFounding Team

Previously: OpenAI (co-creator of o1 and o3)

Kate LauterbachHead of Operations

Previously: Google DeepMind

Dzmitry BahdanauResearcher

Previously: ServiceNow/MILA (co-inventor of attention mechanism)

Matt HortonResearcher

Previously: Microsoft (creator of MatterGen)

Eric TobererMaterials Scientist

Previously: Colorado School of Mines

Rishabh AgarwalMember of Technical Staff

Previously: Google DeepMind

Advisors

Carolyn BertozziStanford University

Nobel Prize in Chemistry (2022)

Z.X. ShenStanford University

Experimental superconductivity

Mercouri KanatzidisNorthwestern University

Materials synthesis

Chris WolvertonNorthwestern University

High-throughput DFT

Periodic is hiring!

Team size: ~30

View Open Roles

Funding History

Seed$300M

Sep 30, 2025

Valuation: ~$1B

Lead: Andreessen Horowitz & Felicis Ventures

Andreessen HorowitzFelicis VenturesDST GlobalNVentures (NVIDIA)AccelLightspeed Venture PartnersKhosla VenturesRadical VenturesBain Capital VenturesCoatueCRVSV AngelEmerson CollectiveHanabi CapitalModern Capital

Investors

Firms

Andreessen Horowitz(Lead — Seed)Felicis Ventures(Lead — Seed)DST GlobalNVentures (NVIDIA)AccelLightspeed Venture PartnersKhosla VenturesRadical VenturesBain Capital VenturesCoatueCRVSV AngelEmerson CollectiveHanabi CapitalModern Capital