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Newsletters · Podcasts · Videos · Partner Content · TechCrunch Brand Studio · Crunchboard · Contact Us · Image Credits:from Axios' BFD event (opens in a new window) AI · Sarah Perez · 1:42 PM PST · November 18, 2025 · Hugging Face co-founder and CEO Clem Delangue says we’re not in an AI bubble, but an “LLM bubble” — and it may be poised to pop. Newsletters · Podcasts · Videos · Partner Content · TechCrunch Brand Studio · Crunchboard · Contact Us · Image Credits:from Axios' BFD event (opens in a new window) AI · Sarah Perez · 1:42 PM PST · November 18, 2025 · Hugging Face co-founder and CEO Clem Delangue says we’re not in an AI bubble, but an “LLM bubble” — and it may be poised to pop. Plus, he noted, Hugging Face still has half of the $400 million it has raised in the bank. This cautious approach to spending represents a different strategy from what other AI companies are doing these days, especially in the LLM space. By comparison, Hugging Face is taking a more capital-efficient approach. “I think a lot of people right now are rushing — or maybe even panicking — and taking a really short-term approach to things. I’ve been in AI for 15 years now, so I’ve seen some of the cycles,” Delangue added. “And so we’re learning from that and trying to build a long-term, sustainable, impactful company for the world.” The Hugging Face founder admitted that an LLM bubble bursting could impact his company to some extent, but noted that the AI industry is so big that it’s already diversified.

The program, based at STATION F in Paris, will run from September 2024 to February 2025. Selected startups were to receive mentoring, access to AI models and tools, and Scaleway’s computing power. On September 23, 2024, to further the International Decade of Indigenous Languages, Hugging ... The program, based at STATION F in Paris, will run from September 2024 to February 2025. Selected startups were to receive mentoring, access to AI models and tools, and Scaleway’s computing power. On September 23, 2024, to further the International Decade of Indigenous Languages, Hugging Face teamed up with Meta and UNESCO to launch a new online language translator. On April 2025, Hugging Face announced that they acquired a humanoid robotics startup, Pollen Robotics. Pollen Robotics is a France based Robotics Startup founded by Matthieu Lapeyre and Pierre Rouanet in 2016. The company was founded in 2016 by French entrepreneurs Clément Delangue, Julien Chaumond, and Thomas Wolf in New York City, originally as a company that developed a chatbot app targeted at teenagers. The company was named after the U+1F917 🤗 HUGGING FACE emoji. In February 2023, the company announced partnership with Amazon Web Services (AWS) which would allow Hugging Face's products to be available to AWS customers to use them as the building blocks for their custom applications. Hugging Face, Inc. is an American company based in New York City that develops computation tools for building applications using machine learning. Its transformers library built for natural language processing applications and its platform allows users to share machine learning models and datasets ...

This marks the fifth acquisition for Hugging Face, after notable additions like Gradio and XetHub. According to Clem's 2025 prediction about robots, "at least 100k personal robots will be pre-ordered" this year, signaling massive growth in the space. This marks the fifth acquisition for Hugging Face, after notable additions like Gradio and XetHub. According to Clem's 2025 prediction about robots, "at least 100k personal robots will be pre-ordered" this year, signaling massive growth in the space. This month also celebrates one year since Hugging Face created LeRobot. The community of LeRobot-native DIY robot builders has flourished on YouTube and Discord, truly democratizing access to robotics technology. In just twelve months, the GitHub repository has grown from zero to over 12,000 stars, with dramatic growth continuing into 2025. Hugging Face is the most used platform for AI builders, with over 7 million users and a thriving community of researchers, developers, and organizations. Founded by Clément Delangue (CEO), Julien Chaumond (CTO), and Thomas Wolf (CSO), the company has become a central hub for AI, hosting the most popular open-source models and datasets, including Meta’s LLaMA 4, DeepSeek R1, Stable Diffusion, Black Forest Flux, Mistral, OpenAI Whisper and millions of others. Hugging Face has raised over $395 million to date from leading investors including Google, Amazon, Nvidia, Salesforce, Sequoia, Coatue, Lux Capital, and Addition. Pollen Robotics, established in 2016, is a leading developer of open-source humanoid robots designed for advanced research and real-world applications. Founded by former researchers from Inria's Flowers team, including Matthieu Lapeyre and Pierre Rouanet, the company leverages years of experience at the intersection of robotics hardware and applied artificial intelligence, to develop innovative and user-friendly robotic platforms.

This robot release was made possible in part by the company’s acquisition of humanoid robotics startup Pollen Robotics, which was announced in April. UPDATE JUL 9, 2025: Hugging Face said it plans to release two versions of the Reachy Mini. The first, Reachy Mini Wireless, will cost $449 ... This robot release was made possible in part by the company’s acquisition of humanoid robotics startup Pollen Robotics, which was announced in April. UPDATE JUL 9, 2025: Hugging Face said it plans to release two versions of the Reachy Mini. The first, Reachy Mini Wireless, will cost $449 and run a Raspberry Pi 5 mini computer. The open-source robots are fully programmable in Python and come with a set of pre-installed demos, as well as integration with the Hugging Face Hub, which provides users with access to more than 1.7 million AI models and over 400,000 datasets. Meet HopeJr, a full humanoid robot lowering the barrier to entry! Capable of walking, manipulating many objects, open-source and costs under $3000 🤯 · Designed by @therobotstudio and @huggingface 👇 pic.twitter.com/wCwo8YPOGV ... Jeff Rubin, from Syracuse University, talks about the ibl.ai platform. [Video] May 2025: ibl.ai CTO’s Talk at CUNY’s CityTech in NY [Video] AI development platform Hugging Face released two open-source robots, HopeJr and Reachy Mini. “The important aspect is that these robots are open source, so anyone can assemble, rebuild, and understand how they work, and that they’re affordable, so that robotics doesn’t get dominated by just a few big players with dangerous black-box systems,” the company’s co-founder and CEO, Clem Delangue, told TechCrunch.

The Robot Studio shared a video of HopeJR assembled for the first time at last week’s Humanoids Summit London 2025. Hugging Face announced in April its plans to sell open-source robots and the acquisition of Pollen Robotics, a company that ... The Robot Studio shared a video of HopeJR assembled for the first time at last week’s Humanoids Summit London 2025. Hugging Face announced in April its plans to sell open-source robots and the acquisition of Pollen Robotics, a company that has spent nine years building open-source robots and hardware. The HopeJR humanoid robot unveiled at Humanoid Summit London could be available by year’s end Liz Hughes is an award-winning digital media editor with more than two decades of experience in newspaper, magazine and online media industries. A proven digital media strategist and editor, Liz has produced content and offered editorial support and leadership for a variety of web publications, including Fast Company, NBC Boston, Street Fight, QuinStreet, WTWH Media, AOL/Patch Media and Design News. Hugging Face co-founder and CEO announced on X that the company unveiled two new open-source AI robots, the HopeJR humanoid robot and the desktop Reachy Mini.

UPDATED 15:36 EST / MAY 30 2025 · AI · by Maria Deutscher · SHARE · Hugging Face Inc. has open-sourced the blueprints of two internally developed robots called HopeJR and Reachy Mini. UPDATED 15:36 EST / MAY 30 2025 · AI · by Maria Deutscher · SHARE · Hugging Face Inc. has open-sourced the blueprints of two internally developed robots called HopeJR and Reachy Mini. The company debuted the machines on Thursday. Hugging Face is backed by more than $390 million in funding from Nvidia Corp., IBM Corp. Hugging Face is backed by more than $390 million in funding from Nvidia Corp., IBM Corp. and other investors. It operates a GitHub-like platform for sharing open-source artificial intelligence projects. It says its platform hosts more than 1 million AI models, hundreds of thousands of datasets and various other technical assets. The company started prioritizing robotics last year after launching LeRobot, a section of its platform dedicated to autonomous machines. Hugging Face’s other new robot, the Reachy Mini, likewise features an open-source design. It’s based on technology that the company obtained through the acquisition of a venture-backed startup called Pollen Robotics earlier this year. A few years prior to its acquisition by Hugging Face, Pollen Robotics detailed an internally developed robot neck design. The module moves using a custom actuator dubbed Orbita. At the time, Polled Robotics detailed that Orbita was powered by multiple compact motors from a Swiss company called Maxon Motor AG.