SAN FRANCISCO--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Mar 5, 2025--
Today, Ceramic.ai emerged from stealth with software for foundation model training infrastructure that enables enterprises to build and fine-tune their own generative AI models more efficiently. Founded by Anna Patterson, former Google VP of Engineering and Gradient Ventures founder, Ceramic.ai improves AI model training speed and cost-efficiency, offering up to 2.5x performance boost, accelerated by NVIDIA, over current state-of-the-art platforms.
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"In the midst of a surge in AI adoption, too many companies are still hindered by barriers to scale – from prohibitive costs to limited infrastructure," said Anna Patterson, founder and CEO of Ceramic.ai. "We're democratizing access to high-performance AI infrastructure so companies can navigate the complexity of AI training without spending hundreds of millions in research and engineering resources. But the shift to enterprise AI isn’t just about better tools – it’s about changing how businesses work. If AI adoption were a baseball game, we’d still be singing the national anthem."
Solving the Enterprise AI Bottleneck
Global AI investments are experiencing explosive growth from $16 billion in 2023 to an estimated $143 billion by 2027. Despite this surge in spending, 74% of companies still struggle to scale AI effectively and achieve value. A major challenge is that building AI infrastructure is expensive, complex, and resource-intensive. While tech giants spend billions developing proprietary AI infrastructure, most enterprises lack the engineering resources to optimize and scale their own AI models.
Current AI infrastructure can scale up to 10x, but not 100x—true exponential growth demands a complete redesign. Ceramic.ai bridges this gap by providing an enterprise-ready platform that isn’t just faster but fundamentally more scalable to power the next generation of AI, dramatically reducing the complexity and cost of AI model training.
The software platform’s model can train with long contexts and any cluster size, enabling enterprises to develop, train, and scale their own AI models faster than traditional methods. For smaller models, Ceramic.ai is up to 2.5x faster on NVIDIA H100 GPUs than current state-of-the-art platforms, and for large-scale long-context models, Ceramic.ai is the only viable choice for fast training.
Leveling the Playing Field for AI Development
Ceramic.ai has developed a comprehensive platform that addresses the core challenges of enterprise AI deployment:
Built by a team of experts in large-scale infrastructure, Ceramic.ai has already helped enterprises reduce costs and improve model training efficiency in early trials. They are partnering with Lambda, AWS and others for accelerated training.
“Ceramic.ai is a game-changer for AI developers and enterprises seeking increased efficiency and superior price-performance,” said Sam Khosroshahi, VP, BD & Strategic Pursuits I AI & Machine Learning at Lambda. “Combined, our offerings provide customers with an accelerated full-stack solution, validated and backed by both infrastructure and model expertise. This enables customers to achieve faster outcomes, reduced development costs, and higher-quality solutions.”
To support its rapid growth and ongoing development, Ceramic.ai secured $12 million in seed funding from NEA, IBM, Samsung Next, Earthshot Ventures and Alumni Ventures. This funding is accelerating product development, scaling the platform, and expanding Ceramic.ai’s enterprise customer base to meet growing demand.
“AI’s meteoric ascent has been like a rocket tethered to a horse-drawn carriage – until now,” said Lila Tretikov, Partner and Head of AI Strategy, NEA. “Anna and her team at Ceramic.ai have algorithmically shattered a critical bottleneck in model training, making it faster, more efficient, and scalable. With Ceramic, companies can scale their already massive AI training workloads 100x – without the corresponding surge in cost or complexity.”
“Our investment in Ceramic demonstrates how IBM drives innovation and solidifies partnerships in highly strategic areas," said Emily Fontaine, Vice President, IBM Global Head of Venture Capital. "We are thrilled to collaborate with Ceramic to address a critical need to reduce AI compute costs, making training more efficient and accessible.”
For more information or to request a demo, visit ceramic.ai, or e-mail info at ceramic.ai.
About Ceramic.ai
Ceramic.ai provides enterprise AI infrastructure to improve how organizations train and deploy large language models. Designed to handle complex AI workloads, Ceramic.ai’s platform optimizes model training, reduces compute costs, and improves performance at scale. Backed by NEA, IBM Ventures, Samsung Next, Earthshot Ventures, and other leading investors, Ceramic.ai empowers organizations to accelerate AI adoption and unlock new levels of operational efficiency.
(Graphic: Business Wire)
SUNRISE, Fla. (AP) — Maybe the end for the Florida Panthers came when Brad Marchand was shut down for the season last month. Or maybe it was when Seth Jones broke his collarbone and wound up missing 26 games. Or, maybe it was 20 minutes into training camp, when captain Aleksander Barkov blew out his knee.
Nobody knows when the season was officially doomed.
Doesn't matter now. The Panthers are out.
Games remain, but the Panthers were mathematically eliminated from playoff contention on Saturday with a 9-4 loss in Pittsburgh. For the first time since 2022, a team other than Florida will represent the Eastern Conference in the Stanley Cup Final and for the first time since 2023, a team other than the Panthers will be the one hoisting the greatest chalice in sports.
They've known this was coming for a while. It's just official now.
“Obviously, no one’s happy about the situation," Panthers forward Sam Bennett said. "But it’s about really just sticking together as a team and going through this as a team. We're all sticking together. It's not fun sometimes. But we’re just trying to make the best of it.”
By the time the regular season ends in a couple of weeks, the Panthers will have gone well past the 500 man-games-missed mark this season because of injury. Barkov, the captain who Panthers coach Paul Maurice believes is the best player in the world, missed the entire year and a chance to captain Finland at the Milan Cortina Olympics as well.
Jonah Gadjovich will wind up missing 72 games with an upper-body injury. Tomas Nosek missed 60 games with a knee injury. Dmitry Kulikov is nearing 60 games missed, most with a shoulder injury and now a badly broken nose. Matthew Tkachuk missed 47 games while recovering from surgery to repair a sports hernia and torn adductor.
Cole Schwindt missed more than half the season with a pair of injuries. Marchand will miss 29 games and Jones missed 26. Niko Mikkola, Evan Rodrigues, Sam Reinhart, Uvis Balinskis and Anton Lundell were all shut down for the season at least a couple of weeks ago. Aaron Ekblad broke a finger this week and he won't play until next season.
And it was no laughing matter at the time, but Eetu Luostarinen missed nine games — after getting burned while barbecuing.
“I'd say we had some adversity,” Maurice said.
Add it all up, and Florida is likely going to finish the season with no more than eight players who dressed in last year's Cup-clinching win against Edmonton on the ice. The Panthers bent, bent, bent all season, and finally broke.
“They’ve been true to it," Maurice said, speaking of the team's culture. "And we’ve had some tough nights, but the bench has been right and they’re cheering for each other. They’re engaged in the game. They’re talking about the game. It’s just, you’re just not going to be able to produce, not going to be able to execute a whole bunch of things that you normally expect to.”
Put simply, the Panthers might just need a break.
They were in 67 playoff games over the last three seasons, the most in the NHL — and unbelievably, more than 17 other franchises played in that span combined. They've logged tons of miles, taken tons of hits and done it all with very short offseasons because their Cup runs kept stretching into June while non-playoff teams are done in April.
“I think we all know ... how good this hockey team is," Bennett said. “We know how good we're going to be when we have everyone healthy and everyone back. So, there’s obviously a ton of excitement, I think, in anticipation for next year.”
With good reason. Hockey operations president and general manager Bill Zito has had the vast majority of the core under contract for some time: Barkov, Tkachuk, Reinhart, Bennett, Marchand, Carter Verhaeghe, Jones, Ekblad, Gustav Forsling, Lundell, Rodrigues, Mikkola, Kulikov, Balinskis, Reinhardt and Jesper Boqvist are among those who are signed. The biggest question is at goalie, where Sergei Bobrovsky will be a free agent, but one who is believed to want to remain with the Panthers.
All that talk can wait, at least for a couple more weeks.
“We're just focused on this year,” Jones said after the loss Saturday.
Things, if the Panthers are lucky, should look very different next season. Or put another way, things could look like how they were in June 2024 and June 2025, when Florida won the Cup. The celebrations started like this: NHL Commissioner Gary Bettman would say a few words, then hand the Cup to Barkov, who would skate away and hoist.
The Panthers felt like that could have happened again this season. For about 20 minutes, anyway. It was at the 20-minute mark of the first full-team training camp practice where Barkov blew out the ACL and MCL in his knee.
“You know right away. Oh, you knew it was bad," Maurice said. “He's a tough one. He doesn’t go down lightly. It was as close to being at a funeral as there can be. The 19th minute, we are humpin', up and down the ice. And I’m taking it all in thinking, ‘Oh, we’re right there. These guys are focused, they’re fit, they’re pushing themselves. I’m not even yelling at them anymore.’ And then that happens.
“The next three days were a prolonged funeral service,” Maurice added. “We didn’t know it was going to be for our season.”
If the Panthers were in the playoff chase, Barkov might be playing now. If there was a Game 1 of Round 1 sometime in the next couple weeks, the expectation is Barkov would have been ready. And now, the Panthers will pivot to Game 1 of next season.
They won't be the defending Cup champions anymore. It might actually rekindle the desire to win it again.
“Bill Zito’s vision for this team has just been so bang on," Maurice said. "We have full faith in the vision that he has for the group, and the core is going to be here next year. We'll all be excited about that.”
AP NHL: https://apnews.com/hub/nhl
Florida Panthers goaltender Daniil Tarasov (40) defends the goal against Ottawa Senators left wing Fabian Zetterlund (20) during the third period of an NHL hockey game, Tuesday, March 31, 2026, in Sunrise, Fla. (AP Photo/Lynne Sladky)
Florida Panthers goaltender Daniil Tarasov (40) is congratulated after the Panthers defeated the Ottawa Senators in an NHL hockey game, Tuesday, March 31, 2026, in Sunrise, Fla. (AP Photo/Lynne Sladky)
Florida Panthers left wing Matthew Tkachuk skates on the ice after being named the first star of the game after an NHL hockey game against the Ottawa Senators, Tuesday, March 31, 2026, in Sunrise, Fla. (AP Photo/Lynne Sladky)
