Abzu raises €1.75 million to democratize AI and put Europe on the map

Pan-European startup Abzu has raised €1.75 million in seed funding, led by Inventure and PreSeed Ventures.

Based dually in Copenhagen and Barcelona, Abzu is creating a B2B SaaS platform to make AI technology and solutions more commercially accessible. In the popular parlance of today, the company is trying to “democratize” artificial intelligence.

“If AI is to be used right and find a foothold, it’s important that the users of our platform find it simple and cheap. The truth is that most neural networks and deep-learning solutions today are consequently very complicated to establish and expensive. We want to challenge that,” said Abzu CEO Casper Wilstrup.

The company’s platform is able to work with limited datasets and self-learn from past experience. Without the need for a large pool of data or investment in manual data science processes, smaller companies can now employ and enjoy the benefits of AI.

“Based on our technology, many more companies -- also those with very little data -- will be able to build advanced AI models to help their business. That’s a game changer that will cut into the technological lead held by such giants as Google, Apple, and Amazon,” Wilstrup continued.

Indeed, the company aims to put Europe on the map when it comes to AI, a space largely dominated by American and Chinese companies.

Timo Tirkkonen, a partner at Inventure and member of Abzu’s board spoke to this ambition: “Europe has not had the first move advantage in the AI space, but it is home to a world class talent pool and a harmonized internal market. Those factors combined allow us to achieve a unique position as horizontal providers of artificial intelligence. We want to create a customer-centric product, built around the individuals’ needs for information and privacy, that will become a global industry standard.”

Founded in February 2018, Abzu has raised €2.85 million to date. The SaaS platform is expected to launch in April 2020.