According to a;Forbes report, Stability AI founder Emad Mostaque has been accused of making exaggerated statements about his background and the company.
;Mostaque is also CEO of the AI visual art startup. According to Forbes, he may have misrepresented his educational credentials, claiming to have a master's degree from Oxford University, and exaggerated the extent of Stability's role in developing the popular;Stable Diffusion;AI image generator.
Stable Diffusion was initially created by researchers from Ludwig Maximilian University (LMU) and Heidelberg University.
- While Stability provided a supercomputer to help with the model, the original developers told Forbes that Mostaque misled the public about how the system was created.
- In response, Mostaque said Stability AI has repeated publicly that it was a collaborator in Stable Diffusion's first release, alongside the Computer and Vision learning group at LMU and;Runway, another AI startup.
- Mostaque also said he didn't attend his graduation ceremony to pick up his degrees, so he technically does not have a BA or an MA.
The report also claims that Stability falsely portrayed organizations such as Amazon, the OECD, WHO, and World Bank as partners.
- It highlights concerns about payroll, unpaid invoices, and financial transactions between Stability and Mostaque-controlled accounts, although Stability has said these were loans.
- Stability AI previously made headlines when it raised;$101M in funding;at a post-money valuation of $1B.
- Forbes reports that its efforts to seek additional funding at a higher valuation have now stalled.