Runway (company)
{{Short description|American artificial intelligence company}}
{{Infobox company
| name = Runway AI, Inc.
| logo = Runway Logo.png
| logo_upright = 1.15
| type = Private
| industry = Artificial intelligence
machine learning
software development
| founded = {{Start date and age|2018}}
| hq_location_city = Manhattan, New York City, U.S.
| area_served = Worldwide
| key_people = {{Unbulleted list|Cristóbal Valenzuela (CEO)| Anastasis Germanidis (CTO)| Alejandro Matamala (CDO)}}
| products = Gen-1
Gen-2
Gen-3 Alpha
Frames
Gen-4
| num_employees = 86
| website = {{URL|https://runwayml.com/}}
}}
Runway AI, Inc. (also known as Runway and RunwayML) is an American company headquartered in New York City that specializes in generative artificial intelligence research and technologies.{{Cite news |last=Metz |first=Cade |date=2023-04-04 |title=Instant Videos Could Represent the Next Leap in A.I. Technology |language=en-US |work=The New York Times |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2023/04/04/technology/runway-ai-videos.html |access-date=2023-09-15 |issn=0362-4331}} The company is primarily focused on creating products and models for generating videos, images, and various multimedia content. It is most notable for developing the commercial text-to-video and video generative AI models Gen-1, Gen-2,{{Cite news |date=2023-03-20 |title=Generative AI's Next Frontier Is Video |language=en |work=Bloomberg.com |url=https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2023-03-20/generative-ai-s-next-frontier-is-video |access-date=2023-09-15}}{{Cite web |last=Vincent |first=James |date=2023-03-20 |title=Text-to-video AI inches closer as startup Runway announces new model |url=https://www.theverge.com/2023/3/20/23648113/text-to-video-generative-ai-runway-ml-gen-2-model-access |access-date=2023-09-15 |website=The Verge |language=en-US}} Gen-3 Alpha and Gen-4.{{Cite web |date=2025-03-31 |title=Introducing Runway Gen-4 |url=https://runwayml.com/research/introducing-runway-gen-4 |access-date=2025-03-31 |website=runwayml.com |language=en-US}}
Runway's tools and AI models have been utilized in films such as Everything Everywhere All At Once,{{Cite web |title=How director and editor Evan Halleck uses Runway for films, music videos, and commercials |url=https://runwayml.com/customers/how-director-and-editor-evan-halleck-uses-runway-for-films-music-videos-and-commercials/ |access-date=2024-03-01 |website=Runway |language=en-us}} in music videos for artists including A$AP Rocky,{{Cite web |title=Distorting Reality with Dan Streit |url=https://runwayml.com/customers/dan-streit/ |access-date=2024-03-01 |website=Runway |language=en-us}} Kanye West,{{Cite web |last=Cowen |first=Trace William |title=Kanye West Shares Unsettling Video for "Vultures (Havoc Version)" Ahead of Ty Dolla Sign Collab Album Release |url=https://www.complex.com/music/a/tracewilliamcowen/kanye-west-ty-dolla-sign-vultures-havoc-version-video |access-date=2024-03-01 |website=Complex |language=en-us}} Brockhampton, and The Dandy Warhols,{{Citation |title=The Dandy Warhols - "I'd Like To Help You With Your Problem (feat. Slash)" - Official Music Video | date=14 February 2024 |url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H3H2AVm1uD8 |access-date=2024-03-01 |language=en}} and in editing television shows like The Late Show{{Cite web |title=How Runway took The Late Show edits from five hours to five minutes |url=https://runwayml.com/customers/late-night-show-cbs-uses-Runway/ |access-date=2024-03-01 |website=Runway |language=en-us}} and Top Gear.{{Cite web |title=How Drew Emery uses Runway to edit content for Top Gear America & Cooper's Bar |url=https://runwayml.com/customers/how-drew-emery-uses-runway-to-edit-content-for-top-gear-america-coopers-bar/ |access-date=2024-03-01 |website=Runway |language=en-us}}
History
The company was founded in 2018 by the Chileans Cristóbal Valenzuela,{{Cite magazine |date=2023-09-07 |title=TIME100 AI 2023: Cristóbal Valenzuela |url=https://time.com/collection/time100-ai/6308278/cristobal-valenzuela/ |access-date=2023-09-15 |magazine=Time |language=en}} Alejandro Matamala and the Greek Anastasis Germanidis after they met at New York University Tisch School of the Arts ITP.{{Cite web |last=Black |first=Julia |title='Not Everyone Is Trying to Build God': Runway CEO Cristóbal Valenzuela Tries to Dampen the Doomerism |url=https://www.theinformation.com/articles/not-everyone-is-trying-to-build-god-runway-ceo-crist-bal-valenzuela-tries-to-dampen-the-doomerism |access-date=2023-09-18 |website=The Information}} The company raised US$2 million in 2018 to build a platform to deploy machine learning models at scale inside multimedia applications.
In December 2020, Runway raised US$8.5 million{{Cite web |date=2020-12-16 |title=RunwayML raises $8.5 million for its AI-powered media creation tools |url=https://venturebeat.com/business/runwayml-raises-8-5-million-for-its-ai-powered-media-creation-tools/ |access-date=2023-09-15 |website=VentureBeat |language=en-US}} in a Series A funding round.
In December 2021, the company raised US$35 million in a Series B funding round.{{Cite web |title=Runway raises $35M Series B {{!}} Runway Blog |url=https://runwayml.com/blog/runway-raises-35-series-b |access-date=2023-11-07 |website=Runway |language=en-us}}
In August 2022, the company co-released an improved version of their Latent Diffusion Model called Stable Diffusion together with the CompVis Group at Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich and a compute donation by Stability AI.{{Cite web |last=Cai |first=Kenrick |title=The AI Founder Taking Credit For Stable Diffusion's Success Has A History Of Exaggeration |url=https://www.forbes.com/sites/kenrickcai/2023/06/04/stable-diffusion-emad-mostaque-stability-ai-exaggeration/ |access-date=2023-09-15 |website=Forbes |language=en}}{{Cite web |title=The original startup behind Stable Diffusion has launched a generative AI for video |url=https://www.technologyreview.com/2023/02/06/1067897/runway-stable-diffusion-gen-1-generative-ai-for-video/ |access-date=2023-09-18 |website=MIT Technology Review |language=en}}
On December 21, 2022, Runway raised US$50 million{{Cite web |last=Cai |first=Kenrick |title=Runway Raises $50 Million At $500 Million Valuation As Generative AI Craze Continues |url=https://www.forbes.com/sites/kenrickcai/2022/12/05/runway-ml-series-c-funding-500-million-valuation/ |access-date=2023-09-15 |website=Forbes |language=en}} in a Series C round. Followed by a $141 million Series C extension round in June 2023 at a $1.5 billion valuation{{Cite news |date=2023-06-29 |title=AI Video Startup Runway Raises $141 Million From Google, Nvidia |language=en |work=Bloomberg.com |url=https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2023-06-29/ai-video-startup-runway-raises-141-million-from-google-nvidia |access-date=2023-09-15}}{{Cite web |last=Wiggers |first=Kyle |date=2023-06-29 |title=Runway, a startup building generative AI for content creators, raises $141M |url=https://techcrunch.com/2023/06/29/runway-a-startup-building-generative-ai-for-content-creators-raises-141m/ |access-date=2023-09-15 |website=TechCrunch |language=en-US}} from Google, Nvidia, and Salesforce{{Cite web |title=Google Invests in AI Startup Runway to Wrest Cloud Business From AWS |url=https://www.theinformation.com/articles/google-invests-in-ai-startup-runway-to-wrest-cloud-business-from-aws |access-date=2023-09-15 |website=The Information}} to build foundational multimodal AI models for content generation to be used in films and video production.{{Cite web |last=Black |first=Julia |title='Not Everyone Is Trying to Build God': Runway CEO Cristóbal Valenzuela Tries to Dampen the Doomerism |url=https://www.theinformation.com/articles/not-everyone-is-trying-to-build-god-runway-ceo-crist-bal-valenzuela-tries-to-dampen-the-doomerism |access-date=2023-09-15 |website=The Information}}{{Cite web |title=Featured interview: Runway AI CEO Chris Valenzuela - First Move with Julia Chatterley - Podcast on CNN Audio |url=https://www.cnn.com/audio/podcasts/first-move-with-julia-chatterley/episodes/b9332b80-fc9b-483e-9ccf-b04c00f2a2c7 |access-date=2023-09-18 |website=CNN |language=en-US}}
In February 2023 Runway released Gen-1 and Gen-2 the first commercial and publicly available foundational video-to-video and text-to-video generation model accessible via a simple web interface.
In June 2023 Runway was selected as one of the 100 Most Influential Companies in the world by Time magazine.{{Cite magazine |date=2023-06-21 |title=TIME100 Most Influential Companies 2023: Runway |url=https://time.com/collection/time100-companies-2023/6285166/runway/ |access-date=2023-09-20 |magazine=Time |language=en}}
On 3 April 2025, Runway raised $308 million in a funding round led by General Atlantic, valuing it at over $3 billion.{{Cite web |last=Vasani |first=Sheena |date=2025-04-01 |title=Runway says its latest AI video model can actually generate consistent scenes and people |url=https://www.theverge.com/news/640821/runway-gen-4-artificial-intelligence-video-generator-filmmaking |access-date=2025-04-04 |website=The Verge |language=en-US}}{{Cite web |last=Wiggers |first=Kyle |date=2025-04-03 |title=Runway, best known for its video-generating AI models, raises $308M |url=https://techcrunch.com/2025/04/03/runway-best-known-for-its-video-generating-models-raises-308m/ |access-date=2025-04-04 |website=TechCrunch |language=en-US}}
Services and technologies
Runway is focused on generative AI for video, media, and art. The company focuses on developing proprietary foundational model technology that professionals in filmmaking, post-production, advertising, editing, and visual effects can utilize. Additionally, Runway offers an iOS app aimed at consumers.{{Cite web |last=Vincent |first=James |date=2023-04-24 |title=Create generative AI video-to-video right from your phone with Runway's iOS app |url=https://www.theverge.com/2023/4/24/23695788/generative-ai-video-runway-mobile-app-ios |access-date=2024-03-01 |website=The Verge |language=en}}
The Runway product is accessible via a web platform and through an API as a managed service.
= Stable Diffusion =
Stable Diffusion is an open-source deep learning, text-to-image model released in 2022 based on the original paper High-Resolution Image Synthesis with Latent Diffusion Models published by Runway and the CompVis Group at Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich.{{Cite web |date=2022-12-06 |title=Stable Diffusion developer Runway raises $50M to create AI multimedia tools |url=https://siliconangle.com/2022/12/06/stable-diffusion-developer-runway-raises-50m-create-ai-multimedia-tools/ |access-date=2023-09-18 |website=SiliconANGLE |language=en-US}}{{Cite news |date=2023-08-08 |title=Stability AI Is Losing Executives, Engineers and Its Edge |language=en |work=Bloomberg.com |url=https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2023-08-08/stability-ai-s-lead-threatened-by-departures-concerns-over-ceo |access-date=2023-09-18}} Stable Diffusion is mostly used to create images conditioned on text descriptions.
= Gen-1 =
Gen-1 is a video-to-video generative AI system that synthesize new videos by applying the composition and style of an image or text prompt to the structure of a source video. The model was released in February 2023. The Gen-1 model was trained and developed by Runway based on the original paper Structure and Content-Guided Video Synthesis with Diffusion Models from Runway Research.{{Cite web |title=Gen-1 by Runway |url=https://research.runwayml.com/gen1 |access-date=2023-09-18 |website=Runway |language=en-us}} Gen-1 is an example of generative artificial intelligence for video creation.
= Gen-2 =
Gen-2 is a multimodal AI system that can generate novel videos with text, images or video clips. The model is a continuation of Gen-1 and includes a modality to generate video conditioned to text. Gen-2 is one of the first commercially available text-to-video models.{{Cite web |date=2023-03-22 |title=Text to Video Generative AI Is Finally Here and It's Weird as Hell |url=https://gizmodo.com/text-to-video-ai-art-generator-runway-modelscope-ai-1850249431 |access-date=2023-09-18 |website=Gizmodo |language=en}}{{Cite web |last=Wiggers |first=Kyle |date=2023-06-09 |title=Runway's Gen-2 shows the limitations of today's text-to-video tech |url=https://techcrunch.com/2023/06/09/runways-gen-2-shows-the-limitations-of-todays-text-to-video-tech/ |access-date=2023-09-18 |website=TechCrunch |language=en-US}}{{Cite web |author1=Avram Piltch |date=2023-06-08 |title=Runway's Powerful Gen-2 Text-to-Video Tool Now Available to Everyone for Free |url=https://www.tomshardware.com/news/runway-gen-2-text-to-video-available-to-all |access-date=2023-09-18 |website=Tom's Hardware |language=en}}{{Cite web |last=Vincent |first=James |date=2023-03-20 |title=Text-to-video AI inches closer as startup Runway announces new model |url=https://www.theverge.com/2023/3/20/23648113/text-to-video-generative-ai-runway-ml-gen-2-model-access |access-date=2023-09-18 |website=The Verge |language=en-US}}
= Gen-3 Alpha =
Gen-3 Alpha is the first of an upcoming series of models trained by Runway on a new infrastructure built for large-scale multimodal training. It is a major improvement in fidelity, consistency, and motion over Gen-2, and a step towards building General World Modelссвs.
Training data for Gen-3 has been sourced from thousands of YouTube videos and potentially pirated films. A former Runway employee alleged to 404 Media that a company-wide effort was to compile videos into spreadsheets, which was then downloaded using youtube-dl through proxy servers to avoid being blocked by YouTube. In tests, 404 Media discovered that names of YouTubers would generate videos in their respective styles.{{Cite news |last=Cole |first=Samantha |date=July 25, 2024 |title=AI Video Generator Runway Trained on Thousands of YouTube Videos Without Permission |url=https://www.404media.co/runway-ai-image-generator-training-data-youtube/ |access-date=July 25, 2024 |work=404 Media}}
= Gen-4 =
On March 31, 2025, Runway released its latest flagship model, Gen-4.
Gen-4 able to precisely generate consistent characters, locations and objects across scenes. Simply need set look and feel and the model will maintain coherent world environments while preserving the distinctive style, mood and cinematographic elements of each frame. Then can regenerate those elements from multiple perspectives and positions within scenes.
Gen-4 can utilize visual references, combined with instructions, to create new images and videos utilizing consistent styles, subjects, locations and more. Giving unprecedented creative freedom to tell story.
Runway Gen-4 allows to generate consistent characters across endless lighting conditions, locations and treatments. All with just a single reference image of characters.
Gen-4 excels in its ability to generate highly dynamic videos with realistic motion as well as subject, object and style consistency with superior prompt adherence and best in class world understanding.
= AI Film Festival =
Runway hosts an annual AI Film Festival{{Cite web |title=Runway AI Film Festival |url=https://aiff.runwayml.com/ |access-date=2023-11-18 |website=Runway |language=en-us}} in Los Angeles and New York City.{{cite web |last=Melendez |first=Steven |date= |title=A new film festival will only show movies made using AI |url=https://www.fastcompany.com/90820457/a-new-film-festival-will-only-show-movies-made-using-ai}}{{cite web |last=Kokalitcheva |first=Kia |title=1 big movie thing: an AI-generated film festival |date=26 March 2023 |url=https://www.axios.com/2023/03/26/ai-takes-on-film}}
References
{{reflist}}
External links
- {{Official website}}
{{Generative AI}}
{{Artificial intelligence navbox}}
Category:Artificial intelligence companies
Category:Companies based in New York City
Category:Software companies of the United States
Category:Text-to-video generation