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Home/Research
Research

Startups Innovate Beyond Transformers in LLMs

MIT Technology Review AI·August 10, 2026·high confidence

Why it matters

  • →Startups are addressing the inefficiencies of transformers, which could lead to more scalable LLMs.
  • →Innovations like sparse attention and power retention may reduce the computational power required for LLMs.
  • →These advancements could enable LLMs to handle more complex tasks and larger data sets efficiently.
Startups Innovate Beyond Transformers in LLMs
©MIT Technology Review AI

Startups are exploring new methods to enhance large language models (LLMs) beyond the traditional transformer architecture. Subquadratic is developing a sparse attention mechanism to reduce computational load, while Manifest AI is using power retention to manage data more efficiently. Liquid AI combines transformers with liquid neural networks for adaptable and energy-efficient models. These efforts aim to address the limitations of transformers, potentially leading to faster and more efficient LLMs capable of handling larger and more complex data sets.

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The story around this

Earlier coverage that leads up to this article, and what followed. Lines connect each piece to the closest one after it, converging here.

vLLM v0.23.0 Release Enhances Model Support — vLLM Releases1Subquadratic claims breakthrough in LLM efficiency — MIT Technology Review AI2OpenAI and Broadcom unveil LLM-optimized chip — OpenAI3Startup Springboards Tackles LLM Groupthink with Flint — MIT Technology Review AI4vLLM Boosts Transformers Backend for Native-Speed Inference — Hugging Face Blog5vLLM v0.25.0rc2 Release Fixes Key Issues — vLLM Releases6Thinking Machines releases Inkling model — Fireship7Smallest.ai raises $13M for human-like voice AI — TechCrunch AI8Startups Innovate Beyond Transformers in LLMsRecall Bottleneck in LLMs: New Google Research Insights — Google Research Blog9Kimi-K3 Text Model Added to llama.cpp — llama.cpp Releases10Together AI Enables A/B Testing for LLMs — Together AI Blog11Qwen3.8-27B Model Explored and Optimized — Sam Witteveen12Liquid AI releases DSpark drafter for vision models — Hugging Face Blog13Jun 14You are hereSep 24

How we got here

  1. 1
    vLLM v0.23.0 Release Enhances Model Support

    vLLM Releases · June 14, 2026 · Background

  2. 2
    Subquadratic claims breakthrough in LLM efficiency

    MIT Technology Review AI · June 19, 2026 · Same story

  3. 3
    OpenAI and Broadcom unveil LLM-optimized chip

    OpenAI · June 24, 2026 · Background

  4. 4
    Startup Springboards Tackles LLM Groupthink with Flint

    MIT Technology Review AI · July 1, 2026 · Related

  5. 5
    vLLM Boosts Transformers Backend for Native-Speed Inference

    Hugging Face Blog · July 8, 2026 · Related

  6. 6
    vLLM v0.25.0rc2 Release Fixes Key Issues

    vLLM Releases · July 9, 2026 · Related

  7. 7
    Thinking Machines releases Inkling model

    Fireship · July 20, 2026 · Background

  8. 8
    Smallest.ai raises $13M for human-like voice AI

    TechCrunch AI · July 31, 2026 · Background

What happened next

  1. 9
    Recall Bottleneck in LLMs: New Google Research Insights

    Google Research Blog · August 12, 2026 · Background

  2. 10
    Kimi-K3 Text Model Added to llama.cpp

    llama.cpp Releases · August 16, 2026 · Background

  3. 11
    Together AI Enables A/B Testing for LLMs

    Together AI Blog · August 17, 2026 · Background

  4. 12
    Qwen3.8-27B Model Explored and Optimized

    Sam Witteveen · August 18, 2026 · Background

  5. 13
    Liquid AI releases DSpark drafter for vision models

    Hugging Face Blog · September 24, 2026 · Related

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