Startup World Labs’ new funding round is part of its quest to advance spatial intelligence, a technology that enables users to generate 3D virtual worlds from text or image prompts
The company, founded in 2023 by renowned AI computer scientist Fei-Fei Li, has attracted some significant investors, including Nvidia, AMD and software design giant Autodesk, which contributed $200 million.
World Labs emerged from stealth in September 2024 with funding of $230 million, when it was valued at about $1 billion.
Earlier this year, Bloomberg speculated that any new investment World Labs attracted would be based on a $5 billion valuation.
“We are focused on accelerating our mission to advance spatial intelligence by building world models that revolutionize storytelling, creativity, robotics, scientific discovery and beyond,” according to a post on the World Labs website.
The vendor’s first product, Marble, was released in November 2025 and lets users generate 3D virtual worlds.
These 3D environments are editable and downloadable, and can be deployed across a number of areas, with World Labs citing gaming and immersive media, robotics and simulation, and architecture and design as potential applications.
Marble is available for free, and in three paid tiers — Standard ($20 a month), Pro ($35) and Max ($95).
Autodesk is one of the most prominent developers of 3D computer-aided design software. President and CEO Andrew Anagnost explained the company’s backing for World Labs in a blog post.
“For the industries Autodesk serves, real impact requires AI that understands space, structure, materials, physics, and time,” he said. “Through our investment in World Labs, Autodesk is advancing physical-world AI, the next major step in applying digital intelligence to how the world is designed and built.”
“If AI is to be truly useful, it must understand worlds, not just words. Worlds are governed by geometry, physics, and dynamics, and reconciling the semantic, spatial, and physical is the next great frontier of AI,” Li said in a statement.
Alongside its investment, Autodesk said it will work as an advisor to World Labs, collaborating closely on research and new models.
Li is among the most notable names in AI, particularly for her work on ImageNet, an open source database of millions of labeled images used in training deep learning models.
