Nebius buys Inferize in reported $100M-$150M deal

Inferize built software for AI cloud and inference providers that need to bring large models online as traffic rises or model weights change. Nebius has acquired the Israeli startup, with CTech estimating the consideration at $100 million to $150 million. Nebius confirmed the acquisition but did not disclose its terms.

When a model needs to handle new traffic, its weights must first load onto GPUs. That cold start can leave expensive machines idle as new instances spin up or weights change during work such as reinforcement learning. Operators can keep spare capacity running for demand spikes or risk delays while additional capacity comes online. Inferize targets that trade-off.

Its software is designed to bring ready-to-serve model capacity online quickly, letting infrastructure operators scale closer to actual demand. Co-founder and CEO Guy Bortnikov said Inferize could load models across different architectures in seconds instead of tens of minutes. That is a company claim, but it captures the economic point: less loading time means more of each GPU's paid capacity can serve requests.

Nebius will fold Inferize's technology and engineers into Token Factory, its managed platform for production inference. The team will begin by integrating its software, adding another optimization layer alongside technology from Eigen AI and Clarifai's core team. Nebius serves startups and enterprises building AI products, agents and services.

Founded in January 2026, Inferize produced a working prototype within three months. CTech reported that it had 17 Tel Aviv employees and raised a previously undisclosed $10 million seed round led by TLV Partners. Bortnikov said Inferize had worked with large AI cloud providers, inference providers and startups during development, though he named none and did not say which were paying customers.

Bortnikov and chief technology officer Lior Gorbonos previously belonged to the founding team at infrastructure-optimization company Granulate, which Intel acquired in 2022 for approximately $650 million. Nebius's announcement emphasizes Inferize's technology and systems-engineering talent rather than a standalone revenue base.