Runway, an AI video generation startup, raised $315 million in a Series E funding round, nearly doubling its valuation to $5.3 billion, according to a source familiar with the matter. The round was led by General Atlantic, with participation from Nvidia, Fidelity, Adobe Ventures, AMD Ventures, and other investors.
The company plans to use the capital to pre-train next-generation world models, AI systems that simulate environments to plan for future events, and integrate them into new products and industries. Runway released its first world model in December and views the technology as central to tackling challenges in medicine, climate, energy, and robotics, beyond its established media, entertainment, and advertising customer base. Adoption is also growing in gaming and robotics.
Runway recently launched Gen 4.5, its latest video generation model, which supports high-definition, multi-shot, longform video from text prompts, audio integration, and advanced editing capabilities. The company has expanded its infrastructure via a deal with CoreWeave to increase compute capacity and plans to grow its 140-person team across research, engineering, and go-to-market functions.
The funding positions Runway amid growing competition in world model research, including labs such as Google DeepMind and Fei-Fei Li’s World Labs.
