Tag Archives: Energy AI

What’s happened in AI: June 3rd-9th

By | June 10, 2019
0 Comment

What do you do when you have a talented team but no chance to compete against better scaled competitors? You sell and move on. Looks like this is the situation Drive.ai finds itself in as it’s rumored to be in talks with Apple to be acquired.

I’m personally a huge fan of Drive.ai. They were one of two startups I pitched in my AI VC thesis a few years ago (the other one being Netra). My thesis on them held true, as I said they were a strong candidate to be acquired by a self-driving player who felt “behind the game”, which Apple very much is. With that being said the return early stage investors are getting likely isn’t great as this will be an acqui-hire and Drive.ai was looking for a buyer for 6 months (not the best sign). Regardless, I wish the team the best of luck in their next adventure. More weekly news below.

What’s happened in AI: May 27th-June 2nd

By | June 4, 2019
0 Comment

Company developments: David Cameron takes job with US artificial intelligence firm – May. 31, 2019 (The Guardian) Cameron said on Friday: “The government I led took a wide range of steps to ensure the UK was successful in the new tech industries … As part of this work, I was excited to see the rapid… Read More »

What’s happened in AI: May 13th-May 19th

By | May 24, 2019
0 Comment

China’s focus on facial recognition continues to expand to various use cases. The latest? Pandas. Our favorite bear is now the subject of a new app developed by China’s Research and Conservation Centre. Given there’s less than 2,000 wild pandas left, the government is focusing on ways to conserve the population. More weekly news below.… Read More »

What’s happened in AI: May 6th-12th

By | May 14, 2019
0 Comment

Two big M&A announcements this week in the AI space. The first one is Salesforce, who acquired Bonobo AI out of Israel for an undisclosed price. Bonobo AI specializes in analyzing customer interactions for sales teams. Acquisition clearly makes sense for Salesforce.

The other big acquisition this week is Square acquiring Eloquent Labs, who provides a conversational AI assistant named “Ellie”. This acquisition should help bolster Square’s NLP capabilities. Other weekly news can be found below. 

What’s happened in AI: March 18th-24th

By | March 25, 2019
0 Comment

Interesting week in the AI world. In the U.S., top executives at Google met with top U.S. military generals to discuss Google’s work with China on AI research. Can’t help but notice that Google might be singled out here given Project Maven (Microsoft, Amazon and other U.S. tech giants also have AI operations in China).

Meanwhile, on the IPO front Megvii is looking to IPO later this year at an ~US$800mm valuation. As one of the top facial recognition startups in the world in the biggest facial recognition market (China), I’d flag this as one of the top IPOs in 2019 to watch. 

What’s happened in AI: February 4th-10th

By | February 11, 2019
0 Comment

Lots of great healthcare developments stemming from AI this week. Researchers from the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai and Keck School of Medicine at the University of Southern California (USC) published data on a novel machine-learning framework they developed that distinguishes between low- and high-risk prostate cancer with more precision than ever before.

On the fundraising side, KenSci raised $22mm to progress their AI-driven prediction platform that helps practitioners cut costs intelligently by identifying contributing clinical and financial factors and by analyzing data across various sources like electronic medical records, public records, demographics, claims data, and devices.

What’s happened in AI: January 28th-February 3rd

By | February 4, 2019
0 Comment

It’s pretty clear autonomous vehicles are one of the most important areas within AI. This week we saw yet another Apple employee get in trouble with the FBI for stealing company secrets on its autonomous vehicle program. Bold move given someone has already been caught before, in addition to the publicity surrounding Anthony Levandowski’s exit from Waymo.

Other weekly news can be found below. 

What’s happened in AI: March 8th-15th

By | March 15, 2018
0 Comment

Breakthroughs / studies: Artificial intelligence can make power firms more efficient: consultancy – Mar. 12, 2018 (Reuters) Utilities can increase their efficiency by using more artificial intelligence (AI) technology, such as software to predict demand swings in the power grid or to control home appliances, consultancy Roland Berger said European utilities could achieve efficiency gains… Read More »