Sept 10 (Reuters) - AI software developer platform

Replit said on Wednesday it has raised $250 million in a funding

round that values the San Francisco-based company at $3 billion,

as investors continue to back AI startups that help people write

code.

Valuations for code-generation startups, or "code-gen," have

climbed as companies look to use AI to assist software engineers

or help non-technical teams to write their own software.

Replit was valued at just over $1 billion in 2023 after it

raised $97.4 million. The company said its annualized revenue

rose to $150 million from $2.8 million in less than a year.

The latest financing was led by Prysm Capital and includes

Google's AI Futures Fund and Amex Ventures as

strategic investors. Existing backers including Andreessen

Horowitz - also known as a16z - and Coatue increased their

investments.

The startup plans to use the funding to invest in research

and development as well as sales and marketing.

In the crowded field of code-gen startups, Replit said its

product is differentiated because it builds vibe-coding tools

for non-technical users in enterprises. Cognition, another

startup focusing on building AI coders, raised over $400 million

at a $10.2 billion valuation earlier this week.

"There's a lot of competition for software engineers, but

we're seeing that people who are able to use Replit are from

every part of the enterprise, from sales, HR, to operations, and

that has helped them with product development cycles," said

Replit CEO Amjad Masad.

Companies including Duolingo ( DUOL ) and Zillow ( ZG ) use

Replit to build applications. Replit on Wednesday launched Agent

3, an autonomous tool that can test and fix code and build

custom agents and workflows.

In May, Cursor, another San Francisco-based code-gen startup

raised $900 million at a $10 billion valuation. The firm helps

users by suggesting and completing lines of code and can write

sections of code autonomously.