VCs expect AI startups to focus on developing AI as a product to solve real-world problems, rather than focusing only on the complex technology. They also expect startups to have a clear strategy for acquiring high-quality data, as access to data is often more important than algorithmic advances alone. Rapid growth is important, but startups need to prioritize developing solutions for specific markets and having the right product over raw technology or speed of growth.

1. Race for AI:
What do VCs expect from AI startups?
Dmitry Filatov @ Sistema_VC

3. B2B investments B2C investments
www.sistema.vc

4. MARKET
PRODUCT
DATA
STRATEGY
RAPID
GROWTH

5. MARKET
PRODUCT

6. We usually get
AI
as
(complex)
Technology

8. We need
AI
as
Product
DC Electricity Cost
Reduction 40%
Face as personal ID
Fraud prevention
Failure prediction

9. RAPID
GROWTH

10. — AI technologies quickly become
commodity
— Open Source (TensorFlow, Caffe,
pyTorch by FB) lowers entry barriers
— Hardware gets cheaper:
GPU, TPU by Google
— More ppl adopt
machine learning skills

11. 50 Best Jobs in America
2016 by Glassdoor

12. DATA
STRATEGY

13. Many major
breakthroughs in the field
of Artificial Intelligence
have not been
constrained by
algorithmic advances but
by the availability of high-
quality datasets.

14. Boeing 787s to create half a terabyte of data per flight
Today everything is a Boeing: mobile, IoT sensor, etc.
BUT! a lot of data ≠ a lot of useful data

15. Public data set
— Web crawl
— DL datasets (ImageNet, COCO)
— Google datasets
— many others…
Cheap & Fast
No competitive
advantage at all
Private data set
— Licence data
— Partner with corporation
— Side business
Strong competitive
advantage
Expensive or many
limitations
— Manual labeling
— Crowdsourcing
Total ownership
Time consuming
& expensive
In house

16. MARKET
PRODUCT
over
TECHNOLOGY
CLEAR DATA
ACQUISITION
STRATEGY
RAPID
GROWTH
is
VITAL
SUMMARY

17. CONTACTS
Dmitry Filatov
d.filatov@sistema.vc
+7 915 0088507
(Mobile / Telegram / WhatsApp)