Last Thursday, Techstars AI Montreal hosted the demo day for its second cohort in the Cinéma Imperial, downtown Montreal. All 10 startups were pitching and presenting their companies after a little over three months in the accelerator.
The event showcased a diverse set of entrepreneurs, applying AI to various industries. Founders from Canada, as well as France, Romania, Slovenia, and Russia, with startups in industries such as aquaculture, reproductive health, public transit, graphics rendering, and music pitched their company to a crowd comprising a large portion of Montreal’s startup ecosystem.
The Montreal-based Techstars program is only two years old, and runs in partnership with Real Ventures. Based out of Notman House, the program operates in the heart of the Montreal tech world.
“With its world-class ecosystem of researchers, investors, labs, and startups, [Montreal] was a great place to make it happen,” said Bruno Morency, Managing Director of Techstars AI Montreal. “We quickly established Techstars AI Montreal as a leading accelerator, attracting AI startups from around the world,”
Graduating companies included:
Spliqs (Vancouver, Canada) creates smart, adaptive musical concepts such as riffs, loops, and creative sparks by harnessing the power of AI.
FLOD (Paris, France) is looking to reinvent the management of infrastructure assets with proactive maintenance using sensors and AI. FLOD provides static structures with predictive maintenance in real-time, allowing asset life to be extended and repetitive inspections to be avoided, by detecting and identifying structural irregularities using vibration analysis.
Nopilot.AI (Russia) is an autonomous vehicle software startup for city services, farming, and delivery. Nopilot has developed a control system based on deep reinforcement learning for real-life robotics applications.
Micropredictome (Montreal, Canada) uses human microbiome and machine learning to create a clinical at-home test for gastrointestinal diseases. The test is meant to be simple, cheap, and non-invasive, and leverages the power of machine learning and the microbial profile of stool.
Hello Iris (Toronto, Canada) aims to build a better dating experience by making curated matches for first dates. Iris analyses uses AI to analyze a user’s messages and learn about him or her then makes a potential match.
MorphL (Bucharest, Romania) believes that mid-size e-commerce businesses are struggling with AI adoption due to a lack of adequate AI expertise, an immense amount of time needed to implement a proper AI solution, and a lack of leadership on AI. MorphL helps e-commerce firms dealing with the challenges of AI adoption by supplying a suite of fully automated predictive models that can be used throughout the entire consumer journey and are agnostic.
Lightmass Dynamics (Slovenia) provides a framework for 3D visualization and simulation in real-time. Without massive computing power, it is almost impossible to simulate the chaotic complexity of physical forces in real-time. Lightmass Dynamics creates a new type of data representation that unifies all concepts and serves as a better model for real-time physics simulation and visualization technology. This makes it possible to replicate and control physical forces on consumer-grade equipment for research, entertainment, or business, without the need for large dedicated hardware architectures.
Blaise Transit (Montreal, Canada) is an AI-based system allowing transit operators to operate buses on-demand based on passenger trip requests, through their universal on-demand bus platform. The day before the demo day, the startup announced a pilot project with Laval’s public transportation.
Eli (Montreal, Canada) provides women with their daily hormone profile, helping them to take control of their health. The team has developed an AI-powered biosensor and its mission is to empower women with tailored and evidence-based knowledge to take charge of their health throughout all stages of their reproductive life.
ReelData AI (Halifax, Canada) is bringing AI to aquaculture. RealData has developed an AI solution that allows fish farms to measure biomass, optimize feeding, and to understand fish health in real-time. It hopes to bring smarter, predictive insights into the aquaculture industry that will lead to an increase in production and sustainability.
Image courtesy Techstars Montreal AI