Recently, Y Combinator-backed startup Flower Labs announced a preview release of its distributed cloud platform, Flower Intelligence. This platform is designed to serve AI models, and Mozilla has already begun using the technology to power the Assist summarization plugin for its upcoming Thunderbird email client.
Flower Intelligence's unique selling point is its ability to support local AI processing on mobile devices, personal computers, and web applications, automatically switching to a private cloud when permitted by the user. This design ensures that applications run AI models locally by default, prioritizing speed and privacy, while seamlessly transitioning to Flower's cloud when more computing power is needed.
Large tech companies like Microsoft and Apple have adopted similar approaches in their operating systems and devices. However, Flower Labs is among the first to build a hybrid cloud-native AI platform entirely based on open models, including Meta's Llama family, models from Chinese AI lab DeepSeek, and the Mistral model.
Flower Labs claims its cloud service, Flower Confidential Remote Compute, uses end-to-end encryption and other technologies to protect users' sensitive data. Ryan Sipes, Managing Director of Mozilla Thunderbird, stated that Flower Intelligence allows Mozilla to launch AI solutions that process the most sensitive data locally.
Starting this Tuesday, developers can apply for early access to Flower Intelligence. Flower Labs plans to make the service more widely available in the near future and introduce features such as model customization, fine-tuning, and "federated" training.
Furthermore, Flower Labs will host an online and in-person summit in London on March 26th, revealing more details and features of Flower Intelligence.
Since its founding in 2023, Flower Labs has raised approximately $23.6 million in venture capital from investors including Felicis, Hugging Face CEO Clem Delangue, Betaworks, and the Pioneer Fund. Early on, they also partnered with the open-source browser Brave.
Key Highlights:
🌐 Flower Labs' Flower Intelligence platform supports intelligent AI model processing locally and in the cloud.
🔒 The platform uses end-to-end encryption to ensure user data security.
🚀 Developers can now apply for early access, with more features coming soon.