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Feb 19, 2026
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Artificial Intelligence
Americas
AMI Labs Launches to Pioneer World Models for Physical Intelligence
NewDecoded
3 min read
Image by AMI Labs
AMI Labs has officially entered the frontier AI sector as a research laboratory dedicated to building systems that understand the physical world. Founded in early 2026, the firm aims to move past the limitations of large language models by developing world models with persistent memory and reasoning capabilities. The lab is currently active and operating across major global hubs in Paris, New York, Montreal, and Singapore.
The venture is led by Executive Chairman Yann LeCun, a Turing Award winner who transitioned from his long-standing role as Chief AI Scientist at Meta to spearhead this new direction. Joining him is CEO Alex LeBrun, the former head of Nabla and co-founder of Wit.ai. This leadership team brings together decades of experience in both fundamental AI research and large-scale product engineering.
Unlike generative models that attempt to predict every pixel or word, AMI Labs utilizes Joint Embedding Predictive Architecture (JEPA). This approach allows AI to learn abstract representations of sensor data while ignoring irrelevant noise. By making predictions in a representation space rather than a generative one, these systems can better model cause and effect in complex, high-dimensional environments.
These action-conditioned models enable agentic systems to plan sequences and predict the consequences of their movements before they occur. This focus on reliability and controllability is intended to provide a safer alternative to the probabilistic token generators common in today’s chatbots. The research team is specifically targeting sectors where strict safety guardrails and predictable outcomes are primary requirements.
Practical applications for the technology include industrial process control, robotics, healthcare, and wearable devices. The lab intends to collaborate with the global academic community through open publications and open source contributions. This transparent approach aims to foster a new ecosystem for physical AI alongside industry partners and developers.
The emergence of AMI Labs signifies a major pivot in the AI industry toward spatial and physical intelligence. While the previous era was defined by the linguistic mastery of Transformers, this new wave focuses on solving the hallucination and reasoning flaws that prevent AI from managing the physical world. By positioning itself as a world-first lab, AMI is directly challenging the dominance of language-centric giants and signaling that the next frontier of automation will require a fundamental shift in architecture.
