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Responsible AI Commitments for startups and their investors.

Over 50 leading investors from across the technology industry have already committed.

Learn MoreRead and Commit

Want to action the commitments? Check out the RAI Protocol  ⇂

Investors who have made the Responsible AI Commitments:

AI has great potential, if designed and wielded responsibly

Never has it been more urgent for the innovation ecosystem to come together to establish industry standards and norms that will help us unlock the possibilities and avoid the pitfalls of this transformational technology.

Startups and their investors need stage-specific resources

There has been a lot of focus this year on developing AI "responsibly." But the large majority of these commitments and resources focus on large, well-resourced, late stage companies.

Early stage AI companies face a unique set of restraints and circumstances. And AI resources need to reflect that: the early stage AI companies built today are going to have a disproportionate impact on what our future looks like.
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After speaking with early stage founders and their investors, Responsible Innovation Labs convened a multi-sector working group to develop startup-specific resources on AI development and deployment. Our work distills RAI best practices and is the result of work from leading AI startups, civil society, and the public sector.
→ Read more about our working group

Introducing the Responsible AI Commitments

The Responsible AI (RAI) Commitments distill best practices and frameworks from industry, civil society, and the public sector. They provide technology founders and their investors 5 key areas of focus:

  • Secure organizational buy-in
  • Foster trust through transparency
  • Forecast AI risks and benefits
  • Audit and test to ensure product safety regularly
  • Make regular and ongoing improvements

Over 50 leading venture capital funds and investors from across the technology industry have already committed:

  • 1infinity AI Fund
  • 7wireVentures
  • Activate Capital
  • Advaita Capital
  • AlbionVC
  • Antler
  • Artisanal Ventures
  • Atypical Ventures
  • Base10 Partners
  • Benchstrength
  • Brave Capital
  • City Light Capital
  • Decasonic
  • Democracy Capital
  • DataPower Ventures
  • Entrée Capital
  • ex/ante
  • Expeditions Fund
  • Fly Ventures
  • General Atlantic
  • General Catalyst
  • Generation Investment Management Growth
  • GG1
  • Glasswing Ventures
  • Insight Partners
  • Institutional Venture Partners
  • Intel Capital
  • J12 Ventures
  • Kinnevik AB
  • Lux Capital
  • Matchstick Ventures
  • Mayfield Fund
  • Obvious Ventures
  • Paladin Capital Group
  • Phoenix Court Group
  • Radical Ventures
  • Ribbit Capital
  • Riceberg Ventures
  • Roadster Capital
  • Sands Capital Global Ventures
  • SoftBank Investment Advisers
  • Square Peg
  • The Garage Syndicate
  • The Westly Group
  • Tola Capital
  • Xfund
  • XYZ Venture Capital
Learn MoreRead and Commit

Responsible AI Resources

Our RAI working group is developing and iterating on a set of resources to help operationalize the Commitments.

| Tools

Responsible AI Commitments →

  • Founder One-Pager
  • Investor One-Pager

Responsible AI Protocol →

| In the News

Every week we curate interesting perspectives on AI news – covering the latest in policy, responsible AI, where AI is going, and looming big questions. 

RIL hosts roundtable discussion with leading venture capitalists and U.S. Commerce Secretary, Gina Raimondo

The Roundtable was hosted as part of our launch of the Responsible AI Commitments and Protocol for early stage companies and their investors.

Read more
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Top VC Firms Sign Voluntary Commitments for Startups to Build AI Responsibly

Top VC Firms Sign Voluntary Commitments for Startups to Build AI Responsibly. The new guidelines are part of an effort to enact some guardrails for potentially thousands of startups across the AI industry.

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Read more

Commerce boosts new effort on responsible AI for startups

Commerce boosts new effort on responsible AI for startups.

Read more
Read more

| Check out all RIL news →

Responsible AI Commitment

We created the first industry-driven Responsible AI Commitment for startups. The Commitments boil down the key action steps into 5 points: commit to responsible AI, foster trust through transparency, forecast AI risks & benefits, audit and test to ensure product safety, and make regular and ongoing improvements.

Sign the Commitment

Responsible AI Protocol

The Commitments boil down the key action steps into 5 points: commit to responsible AI, foster trust through transparency, forecast AI risks & benefits, audit and test to ensure product safety, and make regular and ongoing improvements.

Download the protocol

Interning at RILabs was an exciting and hands-on experience! I had the opportunity to meet thought leaders in the field, collaborate with the RILabs team, and develop my technical knowledge and writing skills. I appreciated the opportunity to manage and lead projects: it definitely helped me grow and succeed. If you are interested in a challenge, driving forward work that will make an impact, and developing new frameworks for responsible tech, then I strongly encourage you to apply!

-  Kasandra Negrete, Summer Intern '21

Interning with RIL was an incredibly unique and fulfilling experience. At its core, this program is designed to help interns gain a better understanding of this complex industry and drive impact forward. I personally appreciated how many opportunities there were to own projects, the highly collaborative nature of the team, and the accessibility of more senior people at the organization.

-  Gabby Ollig, Summer Intern '21

At RIL, I had the opportunity to think creatively and critically about complex issues in the tech space. I gained knowledge and expertise in the most complex matters involving tech, ethics, and law. RIL and its brilliant team encouraged me to stay intellectually curious and actively demonstrate my unique perspective in a notoriously exclusive industry.

-  Hilary Lee, Fall Legal Intern '21

My internship at Responsible Innovation Labs granted me the space to combine my passion for technology and policy. After two months of researching the scope of tech ethics, I left RIL feeling confident that the path towards a more responsible and ethical future could be made.
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-  Hadiqa Shahid, Summer Intern '21

Internships

We believe that internships should be mutually beneficial. We’re interested in what drives your passion for tech and how you believe you can contribute to build an industry that is fundamentally good.

That’s why we’re committed to creating a collaborative environment where you can take full advantage of educational and professional development opportunities, while working on real projects that drive the RILabs mission forward.

CONNECT
Hilary Lee
Fall Intern '21
Brooklyn Law School
Hadiqa Shahid
Summer Intern '21
Rutgers University
Hilary Lee
Summer Intern '21
Brooklyn Law School
Hilary Lee
Summer Intern '21
Cornell University
Gabby Ollig
Summer Intern '21
DePaul University
Gabby Ollig
Summer Intern '21
Harvard University
Gabby Ollig
Summer Intern '21
Scripps College

Our Responsible AI Coalition

Background

Responsible Innovation Labs convened a diverse multi-stakeholder coalition that has developed a Protocol for Responsible AI. It is an evidence-based, actionable ‘how to’ guide for startups building AI technology and their investors. It translates responsible AI principles and best practices from public policy initiatives, civil society, academia and industry to meet the unique needs of the burgeoning AI startup sector.

Coalition Participants

The core working group comprises representatives from multiple disciplines, sectors, and AI-related focus areas. Active core members include:

  • Aneesh Chopra – President, CareJourney; former United States CTO
  • Chloé Bakalar – Chief Ethicist, Meta
  • Chris Kauffman - Principal, General Catalyst
  • Dan Huttenlocher - Dean, MIT Schwarzman College of Computing
  • Daniel Gross – Investor; former Apple, Y Combinator
  • Drake Pooley – Strategic Initiatives, General Catalyst
  • Hemant Taneja – CEO and Managing Director, General Catalyst; Co-founder, Responsible Innovation Labs 
  • Jama Adams – Chief Operating Officer, Responsible Innovation Labs
  • John Dickerson – Co-founder and Chief Scientist, Arthur.ai; Associate Prof, U of Maryland
  • Jonathan Frankle – Chief Scientist, MosaicML
  • Jon Zieger – Founding Executive Director, Responsible Innovation Labs
  • Joy Tuffield – Growth Equity, Generation Investment Management
  • Kevin Guo – Co-founder and CEO, Hive
  • Lauren Wagner – Advisor, Responsible Innovation Labs; Fellow at the Berggruen Institute
  • Liane Lovitt – Senior Policy Analyst, Anthropic
  • Michelle Lee – former Under Sec. of Commerce, Director of USPTO; former Amazon, Google, MIT
  • Munjal Shah –Co-founder and CEO, Hippocratic AI
  • Navrina Singh – Founder and CEO, Credo AI; Member, National AI Advisory Committee
  • Paula Goldman – Chief Ethical and Human Use Officer, Salesforce; Member, National AI Advisory Committee
  • Rahul Roy-Chowdhury – CEO, Grammarly

We are also working closely with leading AI companies including Open AI and Anthropic, who have endorsed this effort and are actively contributing to our developing protocol. Numerous other organizations have expressed interest in contributing expertise, feedback, distribution, etc., including the Stanford Human-Centered AI Institute, McKinsey, Schmidt Futures, Ford Foundation, LinkedIn, Data & Trust Alliance, the Henry R. Kravis Foundation, Business Roundtable, and Responsible Innovation Labs members. 

Our coalition partners are working with us as individuals and do not represent a commitment from their respective firm, company, or organization.

Goals

In May, Responsible Innovation Labs convened a multi-sector working group that outlined the following goals:

  • Focus on the needs of startups and investors
  • Develop resources that foster innovation in AI and promote constructive competition
  • Move fast to reduce risk and create conditions for progress on positive AI developments
  • Create deliverables that are accessible, scalable, action-oriented, practical, and specific
  • Inform and build space for effective, evidence-based public regulation
  • Highlight and leverage the best existing open source tools, resources, and best practices

Responsible Innovation Labs designed this Protocol as a practical guide to help companies:

  • Understand and adopt responsible AI goals and practices
  • Create and follow a process informed by validated tools and best practices to incorporate into the product development lifecycle
  • Contribute to the development of a transparent and responsible AI ecosystem
Approach

The core working group has been developing a set of responsible AI commitments and companion protocol over the past five months, with contributions from startup founders, investors, and policymakers including the U.S. Department of Commerce.

Outputs

The working group has released a set of voluntary responsible AI commitments, which can be viewed and signed here.

The responsible AI protocol (a much-requested, actionable ‘how-to’ for startups and investors) has been developed over the last five months alongside the commitments. We're working privately with a series of organizations to iterate on it before making the document public.

Download Project Overview

What's next?

We are working with our coalition to create a series of public resources that provide the how to the commitments' what. RIL will be sharing more about the Responsible AI work with our community in the coming weeks.

Relevant Materials

As a resource for all, we have pulled together some of the most relevant responsible AI Materials, with descriptions and links. Please feel free to share any feedback or further resources that you think may be helpful in this effort.

Download Resources

Contact

For more information, please reach out to us at ai@rilabs.org

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Rotations

Are you a tech veteran thinking about how you give back? Want to spend a few months diving into RIL's mission? Do you have an idea for a project related to our work that you want to build with us?

We offer stipends for 2-6 month rotations that allow subject matter experts to come build with us.

To learn more, reach out to our team.

CONNECT
Hilary Lee
Fall Intern '21 Brooklyn Law School
Hilary Lee
Fall Intern '21 Brooklyn Law School
Hilary Lee
Fall Intern '21 Brooklyn Law School
Hilary Lee
Fall Intern '21 Brooklyn Law School
Hilary Lee
Fall Intern '21 Brooklyn Law School
Hilary Lee
Fall Intern '21 Brooklyn Law School
Hilary Lee
Fall Intern '21 Brooklyn Law School
Hemant Taneja
Co-founder
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