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A version of this article first appeared in CNBC’s Inside Wealth newsletter with Robert Frank, a weekly guide to the high-net-worth investor and consumer. Sign up to receive future editions, straight to your inbox. Eric Schmidt, the billionaire former CEO of Google , has become known as “the AI whisperer” for his widespread predictions and warnings about artificial intelligence. Behind the scenes, however, Schmidt’s family office has been making dozens of bets on private AI startups. Schmidt’s family office, called Hillspire, has made investments in 22 private AI firms since 2019, according to data provided exclusively to CNBC by Fintrx, a private wealth intelligence platform. Last year alone, Hillspire made 13 investments in AI startups, which accounted for more than three-quarters of all of Schmidt’s startup investments. The dollar amounts of the investments aren’t disclosed, so it’s unclear how much Schmidt has invested in each…
