Pioneer AI: Checking the Nordic AI Pulse.
Welcome to 2024’s 8th edition of The Nordic AI Pulse, the weekly newsletter from Pioneer AI, our Nordic-focused AI investment fund. Dive in for a roundup of AI news, deals, and insights covering the Nordic region.

📚 In This Issue:

1. What Is AI Hub – And Why Did We Create It?

2. Nordic News Roundup

3. Cool Tools and Companies

4. Please “Steal” This Startup Idea

5. Nordic AI Funding News

6. Podcast Insights

7. Upcoming: Nordic AI Events You Shouldn't Miss

Pioneer Insights

What Is AI Hub – And Why Did We Create It?

At Pioneer AI, we believe knowledge sharing promotes innovation.

That's why we've partnered with Borbaki and Talent Garden to create AI.Hub CPH, a network for all people interested in AI.

Read more about why we see knowledge sharing and AI networks as central to innovation and entrepreneurship.

Contradictions litter the artificial intelligence (AI) ecosystem.

Take the speed of innovation and research. We are pushing back the boundaries of science and technology. Conversely, knowledge sharing – if it happens - remains behind the walls of academic institutions, large corporations, and startups.

This has multiple negative consequences. For one, operating in isolated "silos" limits cross-collaboration and innovation.

For example, a university researcher and an engineer working for a health-tech startup can combine forces to create advanced, AI-powered diagnostic tools. An AI expert at a big company has insights on deploying solutions at scale. An AI startup entrepreneur can share agile methods and creative solutions that help others bring new products to market quickly.

But none of that can happen without knowledge-sharing.

Researchers, entrepreneurs, and companies may fear sharing what they are working on, but there are – slightly blunt – counterarguments to many of the most common arguments:

• Argument: We don’t want to share how we are using AI, as we could lose our competitive edge.

• Counter-argument: If you are worried about others copying your approach, you might need to re-examine what business moats your AI approach, solution, and market fit have.

• Argument: Others might misuse our research or technology.

• Counter-argument: Open sharing helps democratise AI development and thereby opens more opportunities for others to ensure that the research or technology is not misused.

• Argument: Sharing may expose security risks and vulnerabilities in our AI systems.

• Counter-argument: Being open creates opportunities for collective problem-solving, and others can help identify security issues before malicious attackers do.

• Argument: We are concerned that we could jeopardize our IP.

Counter-argument: This may be true, but with the speed of development, static IP will only serve you for so long. Open innovation, on the other hand, will be your long-term winning strategy.

The core message here is that fundamentally new perspectives and innovations often stem from mixing perspectives and crossing traditional company and industry borders. We all need to get out of our silos and AI caves and collaborate.

As people, we enjoy talking to and connecting with peers. It is a way to share our ups and downs, get inspiration and get outside input on ideas.

Simultaneously, forums with input from diverse groups of AI experts, researchers, entrepreneurs, companies, and enthusiasts are the perfect vehicle for broader discussions of AI's ethical, social, and technological implications in the broader AI ecosystem are crucial to realise its full potential. We should celebrate AI's positive aspects but also actively address potential negative consequences. Data security, algorithm bias, and AI's impact on the labour market are but some of the issues.

Collaborating on developing ethical guidelines for AI research and application is part of a proactive approach to these challenges. However, discussions must have a starting point in techno-optimism; a mindset that AI is a positive addition to our lives. Again, this is part of what Pioneer and AI Hub provide.

By creating an environment that values and fosters diversity, we can ensure that AI's evolution combines innovation and responsibility.

The goal is to promote technological innovation. We want to ensure that AI development is inclusive, ethical, and sustainable. By creating space for open dialogue and collaboration between different AI ecosystem players, we can navigate the complex moral and social issues that come with technology development and ensure that AI contributes positively to society..

We would love to hear your thoughts on AI Hub. If you want to hear more about it, including how to participate, let us know via email or contact us on the Pioneer AI LinkedIn page here. 

🎙Nordic News Roundup

• This group of young entrepreneurs turned their master’s in investment millions. [DK] (Erhvervsplus)

• This Danish review of Copilot for Office does not mince words. [DK] (Akademikerbladet)

• Saab launches AI-powered military drone concept. [NO] (Forsvaretsforum)

• How AI will impact all parts of the economy, including interest rates [SE] (DI)

• Why companies need to start thinking about the EU’s AI Act now. [NO] (PWC)

• Danish university allows students to use AI for certain types of exams. [DK] (Jyllands Posten)

• AI could free up 70% of social workers’ time. [SE] (Dagenssamhalle) (Paywall)

• More than 50 countries are holding elections this year, raising the question of how AI could influence the process and outcomes. [NO] (NRK)

• Danish municipality sends 200 of its employees on AI courses. [DK] (RKSK)

• Should AI systems have a kill switch? These researchers say yes. [SE] (Computer Sweden)

🛠️ Cool Tools & Companies

• Simpli AI from Sweden focuses on easing AI integration for small and medium-sized enterprises.

• WiseClean from Finland wants to unleash to power of AI to clean your home.

• Kuatro Group from Denmark offers AI consulting services that bridge the gap between AI and GMP.

• Lucero from Sweden offers an AI-powered 3D-cell-culture-handling platform for biotech.

  Do you know cool tools or companies I should feature in the newsletter? Let me know!

💵Please “Steal” This Startup Idea

We would love to see someone build the following (and if you do, we might invest in you):

Introducing "DataCompass AI," an AI-driven enterprise search platform. The platform revolutionises how business users interact with internal documents, offering a unique blend of advanced search, text analysis, and compliance features. NLP and ML technologies enable in-depth text analysis, data protection and the ability for users to interact seamlessly with the systems.

🚀AI Funding News

Select Nordic AI companies that have raised funds in recent months:

• BeCause from Denmark

• Hakio from Denmark

• Portchain from Denmark

• Xensam from Sweden

• Go Autonomous from Denmark

• Myrspoven from Sweden

• Ekobot from Sweden

• Saga Robotics from Norway

• Fever from Sweden

• Codicent from Sweden

Congratulations to all of the founders and teams!

Pioneer AI top 3 deal and funding highlights and insights: 

1: Hakio raises €4 million seed round. Its solutions enhance forecasting accuracy for fashion brands. As an industry, fashion struggles with massive waste and losses due to poor planning. Said losses can reach €1 trillion annually. Hakio’s AI solution is well-positioned to provide a double benefit for fashion companies: cutting costs while also improving sustainability.

2: BeCause fills its war chest again. We’ve covered BeCause in the newsletter before, and now the company has raised additional funding. As we said before, we are big believers in AI companies “going deep,” which is what BeCause does in the hospitality space. We look forward to following their next moves.

3: Denmark’s AI + healthtech ecosystem is making waves. We have covered several funding deals in this space - and the ecosystem is also attracting attention from international media. We expect more deal activity and similar stories to be a theme for 2024.

Are there other Nordic companies that should be on this list? Let me know!

🎧 Listen To

• AI Denmark [DK] - looks at how AI is gaining traction in law companies.

• AI-podden - Swedish podcast explores the future of accessible LLMs on personal devices.

• Teknologi og mennesker [NO] - examines the massive benefits of AI in healthcare.

📅 Training, Meetups & Conferences

Conferences

• 14 March (2024): Applied AI Nordics: Make AI practical and understandable and inspire how to get value from AI in business. [Copenhagen, Denmark]

• 14 March (2024): AI-Con 2024: AI in the context of content and marketing. [Oslo, Norway]

• 17-18 April (2024): AI+: Get the latest updates from the world of artificial intelligence. [Halden, Norway]

• 24-25 April (2024): Data Innovation Summit: One of the most influential Nordic events on data, analytics and AI. [Stockholm, Sweden]

• 25 April: Applied AI Nordics: Leading Nordic AI conference. This year’s subject is how to move from opportunistic to strategic AI. [Copenhagen, Denmark]

• April 27-28: SAIM 2024: Conference for sharing knowledge and results in theory, methodology and applications of Artificial Intelligence, Soft Computing, and Machine Learning. [Copenhagen, Denmark]

• May 15-17: DevSum 20: International conference exploring the latest trends and technologies within development. [Stockholm, Sweden]

• May 24-26: ICMLT 9: The Ninth International Conference on Machine Learning Technologies is a forum for exchanges on current challenges in the machine learning field. [Oslo, Norway]

• June 10-11: SCAI Symposium 2024: The 14th Scandinavian conference on AI (SCAI) that brings together AI researchers and practitioners to present and discuss ongoing AI work and future trends. [Jonkøping, Sweden]

• June 10-14: HHAI 2024: The third international Hybrid Human Artificial Intelligence conference exploring AI systems that cooperate synergistically, proactively, and purposefully with humans. [Malmø, Sweden]

• July 18-19: ICAIAE 2024: Scientific conference for exchanging and sharing experiences and results of using AI for education. [Copenhagen, Denmark]

• August 20-23: Robophilosophy Conference 2024: Social robots with AI: prospects, risks, and responsible methods. [Aarhus, Denmark]

• October 14-18: Process Mining Conference 2024: Industry and scientific conference on process mining. [Copenhagen, Denmark]

• October 21-22: Nordic AI Meet: Symposium early-career AI researchers to network, collaborate, exchange ideas, and form a Nordic approach to building AI solutions for the societal good. [Helsinki, Finland]

• October 21-23: D3A: The Danish Digitalization, Data Science and AI brings together a diverse audience to explore the latest trends and research in AI. [Nyborg, Denmark]

Meetups

• AI Copenhagen

• Aarhus AI

• Stockholm AI

• AI Community of Sweden

• AI Engineering Sweden 

• Oslo AI

• Oslo Generative AI Meetup

• Oslo AI Product Lab

Do you know an event, meetup or similar that you think should be on the list? Let me know!

Got an AI story or insight from the Nordics? Share it with me!

Reply to this email or connect on LinkedIn.

Until next time,

Pioneer Venture AI