2017 AI Overview
This post is a mashup of several resources listed at the end of the post. If I missed something, please leave a comment. I plan to update this document periodically. Last Updated: September 17, 2017
Merriam-Webster’s definition of artificial intelligence:
artificial intelligence. 1 : a branch of computer science dealing with the simulation of intelligent behavior in computers. 2 : the capability of a machine to imitate intelligent human behavior.
Here’s what you’ll find in this overview:
- AI Infographic
- The Current State of AI: Globally, in the US, and Europe
- AI Hotbeds
- Top AI Startups
- The Best Communities
- The Best 2017 Events
- Incubators & Accelerators
- AI VCs
- Corporate Venture Capital & AI: Google, Intel, Microsoft, and Salesforce
- AI Podcast Favorites
- AI Newsletter Favorites
>> AI Infographic <<
>> The Current State of AI <<
People are talking about AI, a lot.
That’s because everyone is excited about all the new advancements in big data and processing.
And investors are putting money where there mouth is. In fact, AI startup deals have increased by almost 5 times in the last 5 years.
And here’s how investors are investing. Almost half of investments, on an annual basis, are seed/angel investments. That signals that there are a lot of new AI startups propping up.
Angel, VCs, and corporations make up the biggest portion of AI investors.
As for exits, it looks like between 2011 to 2016, the world has seen an increase of 414% AI startup exits. Nice!
If you’re curious about the deal distribution, you can check it out below. The top ten investment categories include: Healthcare, Horizontal Applications, Commerce, Ad & Marketing, IoT/IIoT, Business Intelligence & Analytics, Fintech & Insurance, Cybersecurity, Sales & CRM, and Auto tech.
For those interested in the technology aspect of AI startups, you can track innovation trends in Venture Scanner’s four quadrants. This chart hints at AI startup foci.
Per AI innovation technology, here’s where investors are putting their money: machine learning application startups are leading in the funding race with total funding of almost $6 billion. Smart robotics got about $2.5 billion, natural language about $1.75 billion, computer vision platforms about $1.75 billion, and machine learning platforms a little under $1 billion in funding in 2016.
>> The state of the AI Scene in the US <<
The most well-funded AI startups in the US include: stem, Clone Algo, InsidSales.com, NetChain2, Lytics, context relevant, Welltok, Descartes Labs, mycroft, StackPath, zlien, InfoAssembly, AVANT, ensodata, INSPECTORIO, notion, nexosis, lucina, CORE AI, Bastille, pandoodle, TANJO, Digital Signal, Sidecae, Flatiron, Zenedge, YOLODATA, Ommy, Fractal, Butterfly Network, and indigo.
>> The state of AI Scene in Europe <<
Europe is home to over 1,150 AI companies and funded a whopping €1.4 billion in 2016.
You can actually visit the Dealroom’s interactive AI startup map of Europe here. It’s pretty cool!
You can track Europe’s AI startups by stage here.
>> The AI Startup Hotbeds <<
Venture Scanner put together an excellent heat map of AI startups around the world. Note that the darker the green, the more the concentration of startups.
>> The Hottest AI Startups <<
Below I list the hottest AI startups according to CB Insights, Fortune, and Inc.
According to CBInsights, you should know the startups in their AI 100 Startup List.
As per Fortune, here are 50 companies leading the AI revolution. Outside of the US, it’s interesting to note that the UK, France, Israel, Taiwan, and China are notable players. Note their impressive funding growth between 2012 to 2016 at the bottom of the image.
>> The Best Communities <<
Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence: AAAI advances the understanding of the mechanisms underlying thought and intelligent behavior and their embodiment in machines.
OpenAI: OpenAI is a non-profit AI research company, discovering and enacting the path to safe artificial general intelligence.
Stanford Artificial Intelligence Laboratory: The Stanford Artificial Intelligence Laboratory (SAIL) has been a center of excellence for Artificial Intelligence research, teaching …
PartnershipAI: In support of the mission to benefit people and society, the Partnership on AI intends to conduct research, organize discussions, share insights, provide thought …
Artificial Intelligence Stack Exchange: Q&A for people interested in conceptual questions about life and challenges in a world where “cognitive” functions can be mimicked in a purely digital environment.
Artificial Intelligence @ MIRI: MIRI’s artificial intelligence research is focused on developing the mathematical theory of trustworthy reasoning for advanced autonomous AI systems.
>> The Best 2017 AI Events <<
Alex Kistenev put together an extensive list of AI (and bots) events here.
Some of my favorites include:
- The AI Summit, London, May 9–10
- AI for Good Summit, Geneva, June 7–9
- O’Reilly Artificial Intelligence Conference, New York, June 26–29
- AI World, Boston, Dec 11–13
- IBM Watson Developer Conference, TBD
For more AI events, @DrAndyPardoe recommends that you visit: http://events.ai/.
>> Incubators for AI Startups <<
@Francesco_AI put together an AI accelerator and incubator guide here.
Hyperlinks to the above organizations follow: AI Nexus Lab (NY) | Alexa Accelerator (Seattle) | Bosch DNA (Berlin) | Botcamp (NY) |Comet Labs (Bay area) | Creative Destruction Lab (Toronto) | CyberLaunch (Atlanta) | Data Elite Ventures (Bay area) | Deep Science Ventures (London) | Element AI (Montreal) | Eonify (Los Angeles) | Founders Factory (London) | IBM Alphazone (Israel) | Innovat8 Connect (Singapore) | Kapsch Factory1 (Vienna) | Merantix (Berlin) | Microsoft Accelerator (Bangalore) | NextAI (Toronto) | Nvidia Inception (Virtual) | Play Labs (Cambridge, MA) | Rockstart AI Accelerator (Netherlands) | Startup Garage (Facebook) (Paris) | TechCode Global AI+ (Bay area) | The Hive (Bay area) | Voicecamp (Betaworks) (NY) | Winton Labs (London) |Y Combinator (Bay area) | Zeroth AI
>> Investors <<
CB Insights top AI investor list includes: Data Collective, Intel Capital, NEA, Khosla Ventures, CV, SV Angel, Accel Partners, Plug and Play, and General Catalyst are the top VC investors in artificial intelligence.
For an extensive list of AI investors, check out Francesco Corea’s blog post: Unsupervised Investments (I): A Guide to AI Investors.
I’d also keep an eye out for Black Swan Capital.
>> Corporate Venture Capital & AI: Google, Intel, Microsoft, and Salesforce Dollars<<
According to CB Insights, 17% of corporate venture capital deals have been in horizontal AI, 15% in cybersecurity, and 10% on both IoT and Business Analytics.
Alphabet (AKA Google) has invested in AI via Deepmind, Google, capitalG, Google Ventures. Recently, it created a new fund dedicated 100% to AI investments:Gradient Ventures.
Numerous AI investments have been made by Intel Capital, Microsoft Ventures, and Salesforce Ventures. Note: Since 2012, Microsoft Ventures and Intel Capital have partnered on 3 AI investments.
>> AI Podcast Favorites <<
- O’Reilly Data Show: The O’Reilly Data Show Podcast explores the opportunities and techniques driving big data and data science.
- Concerning AI: We explore our concerns about intelligent machines (Artificial Intelligence), how valid those concerns are, and what actions we might take.
- Data Skeptic: Data Skeptic is your source for a perseptive of scientific skepticism on topics in statistics, machine learning, big data, artificial intelligence, and data science.
- Talking Machines: Human conversation about machine learning Talking Machines is your window into the world of machine learning.
- Learning Machines 101: Learning Machines 101 provides an accessible introduction to the world of Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning!
- This Week in Machine Learning and AI Podcast: Keep up with the week’s most interesting and important stories from the world of machine learning, deep learning, artificial intelligence and bots.
>> AI Newsletter Favorites <<
- Artificial Intelligence — O’Reilly Media: The latest insights, ideas, and tools for building solutions that rely on machine intelligence.
- AI Trends — The Business and Technology of Enterprise AI: AI Trends is the leading industry media channel focused on the business and technology of AI. It is designed to keep executives ahead of the curve.
- Artificial Intelligence News — Weekly newsletter on Deep Learning & AI: 2 days ago — Subscribe to a weekly collection of the best news and resources on Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning.
- AI Valley — Top AI News and Resources: Top AI news and resources every day.
- KurzweilAI: KurzweilAI explores the forecasts and insights on accelerating change articulated in Ray Kurzweil’s landmark books
- Machine Learnings: Understand how A.I. will change your future.
>> Moving AI Forward <<
If you learned something new about AI from this guide, please share it with your friends. Growing our community depends on US making it more accessible. 🙌🏼
Speaking of which, I’d love to hear from you. Reach out to me on Twitter 🐤 or email at lolita.taub@gmail.com ✉️ .
Please remember to ❤️ this post, share it with your network and follow me if you enjoyed it!
Sources: Dealroom.co / CBInsights / Venture Scanner / Fortune / @Francesco_AI / Alex Kistenev
#tech #ai #machinelearning #startups #entrepreneurship #MBA #venturecapital #vc
Author: @LolitaTaub — AI Enthusiast. MBA @IEbusiness. @KFundVC Intern. Enterprise Tech. @TEDx Speaker. @HuffingtonPost@WEF @GlobalShaper. Formerly @IBM @Cisco.
