Inside the Model Factory — Eiso Kant, Poolside AI
Latent Space ● Covered by 4 sources
Poolside AI, co-founded by Eiso Kant, released smaller models like Laguna S 2.1 that outperform much larger competitors, backed by a systematic engineering approach called the Model Factory. The company completes model cycles in 8 weeks while running 10,000–20,000 experiments monthly across fewer than 70 researchers, using techniques like streaming data directly into training and low-precision compute. This efficiency enables Poolside to compete as an independent open-weights model company rather than consolidating into an AI oligopoly, shifting the focus from raw model scale to engineering rigor and data efficiency.
Why it matters
Poolside's co-CEO on how his small team of top researchers built a model factory capable of training Laguna S - a 118B MOE beating Thinky's ~1T open weights model... and this is just the beginning.
