A Premier Franco-German Partnership for Open Science in Physical AI
TÜBINGEN, Germany & PARIS, France – May 20, 2026
Kyutai and ELLIS Tübingen announce the official launch of KE:SAI – Kyutai ELLIS Scalable Autonomous Intelligence. KE:SAI is a non-profit open science research laboratory dedicated to the next frontier of artificial intelligence: systems that can understand and act in the real world. KE:SAI brings together two of Europe’s most prominent AI brands to address the fundamental challenges of world models and physical AI. Founded in Paris in 2023, Kyutai has emerged as one of Europe’s leading AI laboratories, with a focus on breakthrough research with immediate and lasting impact, and a team driven by a shared commitment to openness and excellence. It was originally funded by the iliad Group, CMA CGM and Eric and Wendy Schmidt's philanthropy. The ELLIS Institute Tübingen has established itself as a leading center for foundational AI research, attracting top machine learning talent and providing state-of-the-art facilities in Tübingen, Germany. Funded by the Hector Foundation and the State of Baden-Württemberg, and collaborating closely with the Max Planck Institute for Intelligent Systems and the Tübingen AI Center at the University of Tübingen, it is part of the European Laboratory for Learning and Intelligent Systems, a pan-European network of excellence in machine learning.
KE:SAI has offices in Tübingen and Paris. It provides the specialized resources necessary to conduct world-class frontier research in physical intelligence, including high-performance compute infrastructure and hardware prototyping. By integrating foundational open research and the agility of modern startups, KE:SAI will develop a fully open technology stack for physical AI. Unlike related areas of AI, where sharing of algorithms and models triggered an explosion of innovation, physical AI has yet to benefit from this flywheel. KE:SAI’s mission is to accelerate this transition and democratize physical AI. With Europe's ecosystem of global automotive and manufacturing leaders, KE:SAI's open science approach will rapidly translate to real-world industrial scale, establishing itself at the forefront of open-source physical AI.
The research is led by a founding team of renowned experts: Andreas Geiger (CEO), Kashyap Chitta (CTO), and Bernhard Schölkopf, alongside co-founders Bernhard Jaeger and Daniel Dauner. The team’s work centers on the development of compact representations of the real world to enable data- and compute efficient robot learning in simulation. This approach will reduce the cost of physical interaction, enabling deployment of physical intelligence to a wide range of robotic systems and environments. KE:SAI’s first milestone will be the development of a fully open self-driving stack with frontier performance which will help democratize self-driving technology. KE:SAI’s work will also pave the way towards autonomous intelligence across other areas of robotics, extending to manufacturing and healthcare. Initial funding for KE:SAI is provided by Kyutai. KE:SAI is actively hiring researchers, engineers and PhD students in both Tübingen and Paris.
Co-founders of KE:SAI. From left to right:
Kashyap Chitta, Daniel Dauner, Andreas Geiger, Bernhard Schölkopf, Bernhard Jaeger
"KE:SAI explores how data-efficient world models can make machine learning for autonomous systems simpler and more cost-effective. This opens up entirely new possibilities for deploying such systems across a wide range of applications." — Andreas Geiger, CEO of KE:SAI and Professor at the University of Tübingen and the Tübingen AI Center
"Combining the leading open-science ethos of Kyutai with the research excellence of the ELLIS network, KE:SAI will be a unique frontier lab where fundamental questions in machine learning lead to scalable, open-source breakthroughs in world modeling." — Bernhard Schölkopf, Scientific Director of the ELLIS Institute Tübingen and Max Planck Institute for Intelligent Systems
"AI is moving beyond screens and digital interfaces into the physical world, reshaping industries. With KE:SAI, Kyutai is expanding its capacity to develop and ship frontier AI research and models, asserting Europe’s leadership in the field." — Alexandre Défossez, Co-founder of Kyutai
“I am delighted that Kyutai, the internationally renowned AI research lab based in Paris, is now setting up shop in our AI ecosystem in Tübingen. We extend a warm welcome to them! Bienvenue and welcome. Kyutai’s establishment in Tübingen demonstrates that Baden-Württemberg is at the heart of European AI research. In Tübingen, brilliant minds meet first-class infrastructure. In addition to the Cyber Valley Innovation Campus, with the ELLIS Institute, the Max Planck Institute, and the participating universities, our innovation landscape includes other powerhouses such as the IPAI in Heilbronn or the AI Factory HammerHAI, to name just a few highlights. With the new KE:SAI research lab, top-tier talent is now advancing outstanding research excellence in the fields of 3D computer vision, data-driven simulation, causality, and physical AI. Kyutai and Baden-Württemberg are focusing on scientific excellence to enable world-leading AI research with the goal of achieving Europe’s digital sovereignty. I thank everyone involved who contributed to this success.” — Cem Özdemir, Minister-President of Baden-Württemberg
Further Links:
KE:SAI Website
KE:SAI Hiring
KE:SAI Press
Kyutai Website