Cerebras vs Scale AI

By valuation, Scale AI is the larger company at $29B versus $8.1B — a 3.6x difference. Size can also be measured by team: Cerebras employs 400 people while Scale AI has 1,000 employees.

Scale AI has raised more in total funding at $15.9B, compared to Cerebras's $1.8B — a gap of $14.1B. Combined, the two companies have completed 12 known funding rounds.

Scale AI leads with an Awaira Score of 84/100, while Cerebras sits at 79/100. That 5-point gap reflects real differences in funding, scale, and traction — it's not a vanity metric.

Cerebras was founded by Andrew Feldman in 2016. Scale AI was founded by Alexandr Wang in 2016. Visit each company's profile on Awaira for a full founder biography.

Cerebras: Cerebras Systems designs and manufactures specialized processors for artificial intelligence and machine learning applications. Founded in 2016, the company develops custom silicon chips optimized for training and inference of large language models and deep learning workloads. Its flagship product, the Cerebras Wafer Scale Engine (WSE), is one of the largest computer chips ever built, integrating hundreds of billions of transistors on a single wafer to deliver high compute density and memory bandwidth for AI workloads. The WSE architecture prioritizes parallel processing capabilities and reduced latency for neural network training, distinguishing it from traditional GPU-based approaches used by competitors like NVIDIA. Cerebras addresses the infrastructure layer of AI computing, targeting organizations training large-scale models. The company has secured substantial venture funding, indicating strong investor confidence in custom AI chip development. Cerebras has been pursuing an IPO and has attracted investment from firms including Tiger Global, Benchmark, and Altimeter Capital. Its competitive positioning centers on delivering superior compute efficiency and performance-per-watt compared to conventional accelerators. The company targets both cloud service providers and enterprises with significant AI computing requirements. Cerebras represents the emerging wave of AI-specific chip designers competing in the rapidly expanding AI infrastructure market, though adoption remains limited compared to established GPU manufacturers. Cerebras builds wafer-scale processors specifically engineered for large language model training, offering an alternative architecture to traditional GPU-based AI computing infrastructure. Scale AI: Scale AI is a data infrastructure company founded in 2016 that specializes in data labeling and annotation services for artificial intelligence model development. The company provides managed workforce solutions and software platforms that enable organizations to prepare high-quality training data at scale. Scale AI's core offerings include data labeling, model evaluation, data generation, and managed workforce services across computer vision, natural language processing, and other AI domains. The company serves enterprise customers across automotive, defense, technology, and other sectors requiring large-scale data annotation for machine learning applications. Notable use cases include autonomous vehicle development, where precise labeled data is critical for training perception systems. Scale AI operates a hybrid model combining software automation with human-in-the-loop annotation capabilities. With a Series F valuation of $13.8 billion and total funding of $1.6 billion, Scale AI represents one of the highest-valued data infrastructure companies in the AI stack. The company competes in the data labeling market alongside firms like Labelbox, Snorkel AI, and various in-house solutions deployed by large technology companies. Its growth trajectory reflects increasing enterprise demand for quality training data as AI model development accelerates. Scale AI's positioning emphasizes enterprise-grade reliability, security, and quality assurance in data preparation workflows. Scale AI has achieved unicorn valuation by solving the critical bottleneck of high-quality labeled data production at enterprise scale.

Both Cerebras and Scale AI launched in 2016. Same year, but even a few months' head start matters in AI — early movers lock in data, talent, and customer relationships fast.

Cerebras has about 400 employees; Scale AI has about 1,000. A bigger team usually means more revenue or heavier VC backing, but in AI, small teams can build at massive scale.

Yes — they're direct rivals. Both Cerebras and Scale AI compete in AI Infrastructure, targeting many of the same buyers. If you're evaluating one, you should be looking at the other.