Jonas Andrulis studied industrial engineering at the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology. On 27 February 2019 he registered Aleph Alpha in Heidelberg with Samuel Weinbach.
The pitch was specific. European governments and companies were wary of sending data to US models, so Aleph Alpha built transparent models such as Luminous for businesses and administrations. A €5.3 million seed came in 2020 and €23 million in 2021.
In November 2023 the company announced a round of $500 million. Its 2023 turnover was below €1 million with a loss of €18.9 million, and it missed an internal sales target of $6 million. Andrulis has said that being called Germany's answer to OpenAI has cost him the odd sleepless night.
In January 2026 Andrulis left as managing director. Cohere announced in April 2026 that it would acquire Aleph Alpha, a merger agreement followed in September, and the company released the open-weight model Kolibri in October 2026.