Situational Awareness Pivots to Concentrated Chip Bets Following Portfolio Liquidation
AI-generated image · US National Wire
The AI-focused fund doubles down on Source Foundry with a $400 million investment after selling most public holdings to Citadel.
Situational Awareness is shifting its capital strategy toward concentrated, venture-style equity in the semiconductor sector, as TechCrunch first reported. According to reporting from The Wall Street Journal via TechCrunch, the fund invested $400 million this week into Source Foundry, a startup established by Stanford researchers focused on reducing the cost and increasing the speed of chip manufacturing. This latest move brings the fund's total investment in Source Foundry to $500 million.
This aggressive allocation follows a period of significant volatility for the fund. TechCrunch reports that Situational Awareness, founded in 2024 by former OpenAI researcher Leopold Aschenbrenner, suffered steep losses recently due to a downturn in AI infrastructure stocks. Consequently, at the end of July, the fund sold the majority of its public portfolio to Ken Griffin’s Citadel, though it retained its shares in Anthropic.
These maneuvers coincide with a sharp contraction in the fund's scale. TechCrunch notes that assets under management for Situational Awareness reportedly dropped from $20 billion to $10 billion.