The clear exception to the investment dysthymia seen recently in the startup and tech sector is artificial intelligence (AI), with some of the largest amounts of funding in the first quarter of 2023 centered around this industry. According to Crunchbase, about 19% of investments in high-tech companies worldwide were directed to the artificial intelligence industry. ChatGPT dominate the respective list. Many believe that this is perhaps the only industry that is attracting attention, and they are probably not mistaken, as we are going through a period when investment venture funds towards startups fell sharply in the first quarter, by almost more than 50% worldwide.

“There is a dynamic trend in the field of artificial intelligence and, in particular, in what we call generative AI,” Antonis Ilias, partner at Thessaloniki-based investment fund TECS Capital, has invested in Greek startups in the sector. , says K. “In addition to developing a product that solves a problem and is based on an artificial intelligence model, it is also important whether this product finds its place in the market,” he states, adding that “the bar for this technology has been set high.” up”.

Greece is following this trend as artificial intelligence is one of the most popular technologies that Greek companies are “dealing with”, according to data from Elevate Greece. And their path sometimes stands out, as in the case of Augmenta, which was acquired for $110 million by CNH Industrial, the world’s second-largest tractor manufacturer. “One of the reasons we were acquired by CNH Industrial is the use of artificial intelligence in our technology. That is what they saw in us as a technology provider that can make machines smarter.” Dimitris Evagelopoulos explains “K”.one of the founders of Augmenta, a company operating in the agrotech sector.

Together with Giorgos Varvarelis, he developed a system with multispectral cameras that is installed on the roof of agricultural machinery and, using artificial intelligence, determines the points where the crop needs fertilizers or some other chemicals (herbicides, fungicides, etc.).

In the first quarter, 19% of investments in high-tech companies worldwide were in the artificial intelligence industry.

The system then decides to apply fertilizer to the area of ​​the field where it is needed, and then sends the crop status data to the Augmenta platform, where it is visualized and presented to farmers in the form of maps and statistics.

“If you think about it, in our industry, our grandparents practiced the ‘first’ type of precision farming. This is because they did all the work by hand, they could determine the needs of the field, problems, etc. Later, when machines came along, the industry was industrialized, productivity increased, but the real connection with the needs of the field was lost. So accuracy was lost. Today, however, we have reached a point where machines cannot be radically improved, but on the other hand, it is important to understand exactly what is happening in the field. This is where artificial intelligence fits in,” he explains.

In addition to mature startups, there are those in Greece that want to make their mark on the world map by initially testing their product as a pilot. Moverse, which “raised” 300,000 euros from TECS Capital at the beginning of the year, is one of them. “With the software we have developed, we are committed to human movement and its digitization. This is the so-called motion capture, which is used in a wide variety of industries, from cinema to video games. Argyris Hatsitofis reports to K., one of its founders, who holds a PhD in motion capture and artificial intelligence. “In addition to capturing human movements using artificial intelligence, the Moverse software aims to create new human movements without the user having to record them,” the post reads. The Moverse solution saves resources because in the past very expensive equipment was required to record human movements. In addition, with his software, the creation – from scratch – of human movements could be performed even from … a home sofa. He recently attended the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona with the rest of the company’s founders to present its product. “This technology is attracting the attention of giants. Several people have contacted us expressing interest in discussing our technology. This is the case with Samsung as well as other big technology companies,” said Mr. Hatsitofis “K”, who is currently at the Beyond 2023 Technology Exhibition in Thessaloniki. After all, the impetus for starting the company in early 2023 was not the ousting of ChatGPT, an artificial intelligence tool that can provide answers to a lot of questions in a few seconds. “We knew how revolutionary Generative AI technology was even before ChatGPT was known to everyone. We found a gap in human motion capture technology and thought it would be a good idea to upgrade this technology with artificial intelligence.”

However, Europe is far behind in the development of the sector, as emphasized by Dimitris Kottas, founder of Lambda Automata, a Greek company that has developed artificial intelligence robots to guard critical infrastructure, coastlines and borders. “We are behind the development of artificial intelligence in Europe, and the legal framework being promoted risks becoming hostile to the industry. In addition, we must not forget that the top AI applications are developed not by European, but by Chinese and American companies.”