Karla Barker 
Brett Adcock, the founder of Figure AI and Hark, announced that his AI infrastructure company closed a $700 million Series A round led by Parkway Venture Capital. The round valued Hark at $6 billion and included participation from NVIDIA, AMD Ventures, Intel Capital, Qualcomm Ventures, and Salesforce Ventures.
Adcock said the fresh capital will go toward scaling Hark’s GPU infrastructure, expanding the team from 70 to roughly 200 engineers, and designing new AI hardware. The company’s longer-term goal is to build what they call “personal intelligence” — a system that goes beyond basic chatbots and includes memory, vision, and the ability to see and interact with the world in real time.
Hardware-first approach
Unlike many AI labs that focus mostly on software models, Hark puts hardware and vertical integration first. The company says its AI models will run on chips and devices built specifically for true intelligence. The system is designed to store persistent memory of a user’s life, listen, see, and interact in real time. Hark also plans to release a family of AI-native hardware devices — both for personal use and for the home.
Adcock mentioned the company has brought in experts from Apple, Meta, Google, Tesla, and Amazon. Hark operates on the same campus as Figure, which Adcock also owns, allowing the two firms to share robotics and AI enhancements.
AI fundraising frenzy continues
The massive round is the latest sign of how much capital ambitious AI hardware and model builders are attracting. According to PitchBook, AI startups raised $255.5 billion globally in the first quarter of 2026. That single quarter already surpassed the $254.4 billion raised in all of 2025.
In the first two weeks of 2026 alone, there were more than 200 AI-related deals totaling over $25 billion. Most of that money went to three well-known companies: OpenAI, Anthropic, and xAI, which together accounted for over 67% of all AI funding in the quarter.
A report from 36Kr.com noted that the United States captured 81% of global AI venture dollars in Q1 2026, up from just 55% a year earlier. Sovereign wealth funds like Singapore’s GIC and Temasek, and the Qatar Investment Authority, have become major players, co-leading giant rounds for Anthropic and OpenAI because traditional venture firms can’t write $10 billion or $30 billion checks alone.
Racing for AI hardware dominance
Hark’s funding comes at a time when competition in AI hardware is heating up. OpenAI is set to unveil its first hardware device in the second half of 2026, developed with former Apple design chief Jony Ive. Apple is reportedly working on an AI wearable pin with two cameras and three microphones, and is aiming to release smart glasses by the end of 2026 to rival Meta’s popular Ray-Bans.
Gartner recently reported that global spending on data centers is expected to grow nearly 56% in 2026, reaching over $788 billion. That figure underscores the massive demand for compute infrastructure that companies like Hark are trying to fill.