Is A.I. any match for the law? Steve Cohen, the billionaire hedge fund investor behind Point72 Asset Management, certainly seems to think so. Point72 Private Investments, an arm under Cohen’s New York-based hedge fund, is the lead investor in a new $75 million funding round for Luminance, a startup using A.I. to draft and negotiate legal contracts.
Cohen, who has an estimated net worth of $21.3 billion and is also the owner of the New York Mets, has lauded A.I. as “transformational“—and matched his proclamations with major investments that last year included launching a new A.I. fund.
Luminance was founded in London in 2015 by A.I. experts from the University of Cambridge. Through an A.I. system dubbed the “Panel of Experts,” it allows businesses to infuse A.I. across contract generation, negotiation and analysis. The legal company works with more than 700 organizations, with clients including the likes of chipmaker AMD (AMD) and Japanese conglomerate Hitachi.
“We know this market well and strongly believe in the power of next-generation A.I. to revolutionize contracting processes across the enterprise,” said Sri Chandrasekar, managing partner of Point72 Private Investments, in a statement. Other participants in Luminance’s new funding round, which was announced yesterday (Feb. 18) and brings the startup’s total funding over the past year to $115 million, included Forestay Capital, RPS Ventures and Schroders Capital.
Steve Cohen’s A.I. ambitions
Cohen, who stepped away from day-to-day trading at Point72 Asset Management last year but remains its chief executive, has bet big on A.I.’s potential in recent months.
Last year, Cohen launched an A.I. fund to focus on the hardware and semiconductor companies underpinning the burgeoning sector. Named Turion and operating as Point72’s first new fund in decades, it began trading in October with a goal of raising around $1.5 billion in early 2025. This figure has since been met, announced Cohen last month during a hedge fund conference in Miami where he described the fund as part of being “more expansive about how I think about what the firm can do.” Point72 Asset Management currently has $36.9 billion worth of assets under management.
At the same Miami conference, Cohen additionally addressed recently released A.I. models from DeepSeek, a Chinese A.I. firm that challenged the dominance of U.S. A.I. developers. While the rapid developments briefly shocked markets, Cohen attributed the rout to misinformed investors and noted that DeepSeek’s progress is actually a good sign for the sector.
“Our view is that what happened with DeepSeek is actually bullish because it advances the move to artificial super intelligence,” said Cohen, referencing A.I. systems with capabilities exceeding those of humans. “That’s coming, and it’s coming quick,” he added.
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