Three AI-Crypto Firms Are Said to Near Deal to Merge Tokens

Michelle F. Davis, Bloomberg News

(Bloomberg) -- Three artificial intelligence companies that operate on blockchain are in talks to merge their crypto tokens, a move aimed at helping them develop a decentralized AI platform.

SingularityNET, Fetch.ai and Ocean Protocol are discussing merging their tokens into an ASI token that would have a fully diluted value of about $7.5 billion, according to people familiar with the matter. The deal, which could be announced as soon as Wednesday, would hinge on approval from the members of each community, said the the people, who asked not to be identified because the information was private.

While the three platforms would continue to operate as separate entities, they would collaborate under the guidance of a so-called Superintelligence Collective run by Ben Goertzel, founder and chief executive officer of SingularityNET, the people said. Fetch.ai CEO Humayun Sheikh — an early investor in DeepMind, the AI company that Google bought in 2014 —would be chairman, the people said.

Representatives for SingularityNET, Fetch.ai and Ocean Protocol declined to comment.

The discussions come as big tech companies including Alphabet Inc. and Microsoft Corp. are investing heavily in AI, which has the potential to change the way people interact with technology.

Upstart AI-oriented platforms such as SingularityNET, Fetch.ai and Ocean Protocol in turn are racing to develop decentralized AI technology on blockchain, the idea being that it wouldn’t be controlled by large companies beholden to shareholders.

--With assistance from Sunil Jagtiani.