Thomas Reardon’s career spans software development, neuroscience, and entrepreneurship. He built Internet Explorer at Microsoft as a teenager, earned a PhD in neuroscience from Columbia, and founded CTRL-labs, which enabled computer control via muscle signals.
Meta acquired CTRL-labs in 2019 for about $500 million. Reardon later led neuromotor interface research at Meta Reality Labs and became a venture partner at Lux Capital. He is now raising capital for his next venture.
Flourish, Reardon’s new company, is seeking funding at a $2.5 billion valuation, according to Bloomberg. Investors have already committed approximately $500 million. Lux Capital and GV, who led CTRL-labs’ Series A, are expected to lead this round as well, continuing a decade-long partnership with Reardon. The terms remain subject to change.
Flourish aims to address a major AI challenge: the substantial amount of electricity required to train and run large models. Traditional solutions like boosting computing power and accepting higher energy costs are reaching limits. Constraints such as grid capacity, cooling needs, and rising costs are slowing AI growth. Flourish focuses on improving the efficiency of AI systems themselves.
Reardon uses his neuroscience expertise to guide Flourish’s strategy. The company brings together AI researchers and neuroscientists to study connectomics, the study of neural connections in the brain, to inspire new AI designs. While the human brain runs on about 20 watts, leading AI systems need megawatts. Closing this efficiency gap is Flourish’s main goal.
Competition in this sector is strong. Groq and Cerebras develop specialised chips for faster, more efficient AI, while Etched produces transformer-specific chips that consume less energy than GPUs. Flourish differentiates itself by prioritising algorithm and architecture improvements, guided by neuroscience, rather than focusing solely on chip design.
Flourish eyes a $2.5 billion valuation despite no public product or clear revenue model.
