Definition
Plain language
A model lab whose open-weight models are used as teachers in distillation pipelines.
As stated in the literature
An AI company whose open-weight foundation models (e.g., MiniMax M2.5) serve as teacher models in agent distillation work like Orchard.
Why it matters: Open-weight teacher models let outside researchers build strong agents without depending on closed APIs.
For example, a research team might distill MiniMax M2.5's agent behavior into a smaller open student model.
Heard on the show
“A team at MiniMax pulled thirty proofs out of a reinforcement-learning run — thirty proofs their automated grader had scored as essentially perfect.”Episode 133 — How MiniMax Turned a Reward-Hacking Disaster Into Olympiad Gold