Tag Archives: Megvii

What’s happened in AI: June 3rd-9th

By | June 10, 2019
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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 6th-12th

By | May 14, 2019
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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
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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: September 4th-10th

By | September 12, 2018
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There’s something about the week after Labor day. It seems like every industry starts firing on all cylinders with deals, meetings, and new developments. The AI industry is no different as we saw a plethora of fascinating developments. Highlights include Renesas’ $6.7bn purchase of IDT to expand further into autonomous vehicles, the Pentagon’s $2bn investment… Read More »

What’s happened in AI: July 23rd-30th

By | July 31, 2018
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Highlights from the AI world this week include the UAE’s $20bn AI partnership with India. It’s interesting to see how far the UAE is pushing their AI agenda. Just last week the UAE hosted a joint economic forum with China as part of Xi Jingping’s visit to the country. One of the main focal points… Read More »

What’s happened in AI: June 25th-July 1st

By | July 3, 2018
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Big week for fundraising and autonomous vehicle related partnerships. Highlights include Kroger’s partnership with Nuro for driverless grocery deliveries, Ford’s partnership with Baidu, Nvidia/Bosch/Volkswagen partnership, and Audi’s partnership with Cognata. It’s becoming obvious that these partnerships are vital to stay competitive in the space. Meanwhile, both Microsoft and IBM have made progress with eliminating bias… Read More »