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Intuit Canada President Jeff Cates on the democratizing power of AI (BETAKIT)
Cates believes that AI and machine learning means insights “historically only available to large companies can be made available to small business.”
Powering customer journeys in the age of AI (TECHCRUNCH)
“Businesses today are trying to augment and improve their customer, partner and employee experiences by leveraging AI. However, what many have yet to realize is that AI is only as good as the APIs that support it.”
AI and FinTech: What’s next for Canada’s hottest sectors? (BETAKIT)
As the year wraps up, where are these these two sectors—which have both been among the most attractive for VCs—headed in 2019?
Chorus.ai raises $33 million for AI that listens in on sales calls (VENTUREBEAT)
Chorus.ai, a service that listens to sales calls in real time, and then transcribes and analyses them to give helpful tips to the salesperson, raised the funding from Georgian Partners, with participation from Redpoint Ventures, Emergence Capital, and other previous investors.
TechSee nabs $16M for its customer support solution built on computer vision and AR (TECHCRUNCH)
TechSee will using the funding to help build out an AI-based video service, which uses computer vision, augmented reality and a customer’s own smartphone camera to provide tech support to customers, either alongside assistance from live agents, or as part of a standalone customer service “bot.”
Optibus raises $40 million for AI that optimizes bus routes (VENTUREBEAT)
Optibus has developed a web-based transit operations solution that helps plan and schedule the movements of drivers and vehicles, reducing costs by up to 15 percent in the process.
BlackBerry launches security system for autonomous vehicles (BETAKIT)
BlackBerry says Security Credential Management System (SCMS) has no service fees to automakers and public offices that are “involved in smart city and connected vehicle pilots.”
China has never had a real chip industry. Making AI chips could change that. (TECHNOLOGYREVIEW)
The country has struggled for decades to build a competitive semiconductor industry. In making specialized AI chips, though, it’s got a head start.
Pypestream raises $15 million for conversational enterprise AI (VENTUREBEAT)
The funding was led by insurance company W.R. Berkley.
Tencent-backed fleet manager G7 racks up $320M in funding (TECHCRUNCH)
G7, which runs a proprietary connected platform for trucks, shippers, fleet manager and drivers, received the proceeds from lead investor HOPU Investments, one of the most high-profile private equity firms in China.
BCF Ventures reaches $12 million in commitments for its ‘super angel’ fund (BETAKIT)
As a core investment thesis, the fund believes in investing in cloud and SaaS companies leveraging AI, big data, analytics, and security.
University of Guelph launches AI ethics centre amid growing debate around data privacy, bias (THESTAR)
Zeroing in on the moral side of everything from medical imaging to automated credit card approvals, the Centre for Advancing Responsible and Ethical Artificial Intelligence (CARE-AI) aims to bring together experts to study and teach humanist approaches to AI.
AI-powered knowledge-sharing platform Guru raises $25 million Series B (TECHCRUNCH)
The funding was led by Thrive Capital, with participation from existing investors Emergence Capital, FirstMark Capital, Slack Fund, and Michael Dell’s MSD Capital.
Osprey Informatics raises $3.75 million in funding (BETAKIT)
Osprey says its monitoring solutions platform is used by more than 30 North American energy companies.