Montréal-based Vention is opening a new physical AI research lab in an effort to stay ahead of the automated manufacturing curve.
“I think we’re actually leading in a place where a lot of people are not spending enough time right now.”
Etienne Lacroix, Vention
Vention, which offers engineering software and hardware to help manufacturing professionals design, order, and deploy automated equipment, has been working on the lab since late last year. CEO Etienne Lacroix took the company’s 400 percent increase in physical AI-related revenues over the past year as a sign to officially open the space and get rolling on new physical AI capabilities this week.
While Lacroix did not disclose specific revenue figures or how much Vention is investing in the new effort, he said research and development (R&D) remains Vention’s largest investment area.
“We thought it was the right time for us to have this R&D team that is more on the R than the D,” Lacroix told BetaKit in an interview. “This team works on missions that are 12 months out, as opposed to most of our team [who are] dedicated to the next quarter or the next release.”
Physical AI refers to AI systems that operate in and interact with the physical world, like robots. The new lab is led by Vention director of physical AI Jimmy Li and holds 16 of the company’s 120 R&D employees, with the small team beholden to research objectives instead of ship dates. Lacroix said the lab will be figuring out applied use cases for robotics, and has already supported the development of GRIIP, Vention’s robotic system for picking parts off the assembly line.
Founded in 2016, Vention has roughly 330 employees, and its physical AI platform is deployed in more than 4,000 factories worldwide, including companies like Boeing, L’Oreal, and Lockheed Martin. Lacroix thinks that, once physical AI really takes off, it will pump the value of the $130-billion manufacturing automation market by up to a factor of 10. He hopes Vention’s new lab is his way of making sure that demand is captured.
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“One thing I’ve learned over the years of managing technology teams is you don’t want to miss the fork,” Lacroix said, noting BlackBerry and Kodak as two companies that missed their proverbial fork. “We’ll let the pre-trainers of [AI] models fight it out, and eventually a technology will converge, and we’ll be ready to reap the benefit because everything else is ready.”
Lab head Li will also get some part-time help from Joelle Pineau, the chief AI officer of Canada’s leading AI model developer Cohere. Pineau will act as Vention’s external advisor and robotics expert, helping the company set its research agenda and providing a semblance of governance over the lab, Lacroix said. Overall, Lacroix sees Vention’s new lab as a “phenomenal space for any researcher,” particularly those who want to stay in Canada and be surrounded by very expensive robotic equipment.
“Vention’s lab is by far the biggest in Canada, by a significant margin,” Lacroix claimed. “I think we’re actually leading in a place where a lot of people are not spending enough time right now, which is deployability of the physical layer, so I think it’s just great for the country.”
Feature image courtesy Vention.