AI developer Vianai Systems has raised USD 140 million in a Series B financing round, the company said on Wednesday. The capital was raised from SoftBank Vision Fund 2 and two previous investors, the company said. Vianai will use the funding to accelerate the delivery of its human-centered AI platform and products to enterprises worldwide.
Founded in 2019, Vianai Systems is headquartered in California, with ten of its 40 employees at its research and development center in Israel. The office is in Herzliya Pituach. The company’s pioneering human-centered AI approach amplifies human judgment, thus empowering domain experts with AI tools to deliver powerful business value. Vianai has already delivered successful business outcomes to numerous world-leading enterprises.
The company is set to double its team in Israel in the next few months.
“Vianai’s human-centered approach to AI has been critical to the design of an advanced early warning system for our underwriters. The system, which extracts actionable insights from non-traditional data sources, has the potential to drive significant business value for us and our customers,” said Torsten Jeworrek, member of the group executive board and global head of reinsurance at Munich Re. “With Vianai as an innovation partner, Munich Re is on a path towards breakthrough digital transformation of our core business, and that of the industry as a whole.”
Fei-Fei Li, co-director of the Stanford Institute for Human-Centered AI, will join Vianai as an advisor. “I believe that AI is made by humans, intended to behave like humans, and, ultimately, to impact human lives and human society. Its success depends on how humans and AI work together,” she said.
“With the AI revolution underway, we believe Vianai’s human-centered AI platform and products provide global enterprises with operational and customer intelligence to make better business decisions,” said Deep Nishar, senior managing partner at SoftBank Investment Advisers. “We are pleased to partner with Dr. Sikka and the Vianai team to support their ambition to fulfill AI’s promise to drive fundamental digital transformations.”
“I am grateful for the trust and the confidence that our customers and our investors have put in us,” said Vishal Sikka, founder and CEO of Vianai. “We are looking forward to helping enterprises achieve a purposeful and fundamental transformation with human-centered AI.”
Vianai’s investors include Jim Davidson, co-founder of Silver Lake; Henry Kravis and George Roberts, co-founders of KKR; and Jerry Yang, founding partner of AME and co-founder of Yahoo! Inc.
The article was originally published by NoCamels, a leading news website covering breakthrough innovation from Israel for a global audience.
