Pika Labs Review — The $470M Stanford Startup That Made AI Video Fast, Affordable, and Consumer-First

Two Stanford PhD dropouts founded Pika Labs in 2023 and raised $135M at a $470M valuation by making AI video generation faster and more accessible than anyone else. By 2026, Pika 2.5 delivers 1080p clips in under 90 seconds, Pikaframes enables keyframe-to-keyframe animation, Pikaformance does near-real-time lip sync, and an official MCP server at mcp.pika.me integrates with Claude. We review the full model stack, the consumer pivot, the Adobe Firefly partnership, and where Pika sits in an increasingly crowded field.