 Richard Socher You.com CEO Richard Socher launched AIX Ventures, a $50M venture fund focused on AI startups. Socher, the former chief scientist at Salesforce, co-founded the fund with Shaun Johnson, Pieter Abbeel, Anthony Goldbloom, and Chris Manning. More: - The venture has raised $50M and assembled entrepreneurs and researchers to support early-stage startups.
- AIX's first tranche, called Fund, closed in Oct. 2021 and has roughly 40 portfolio companies.
- These include NLP startup Hugging Face, Weights & Biases, and Time by Ping.
- Fund II is also in the works.
- Socher will lead the AIX investment partner team. The fund will invest in companies in the seed and pre-seed phases in areas like NLP, computer vision, and robotics.
Zoom-out: - Private investment in AI, led by larger funding rounds, more than doubled from 2020 to 2021, according to a recent study from the Stanford Institute for Human-Centered Artificial Intelligence (HAI).
- Last year's investment reached nearly $93.6B, HAI found. Of that, $52.9B was funneled to U.S. companies.
- At $12.2B, data management, processing, and cloud garnered the most private AI investment.
- Medical and healthcare were second with $11.29B, followed by fintech ($10.26B), AV ($8.09B), and semiconductors ($6B).
VENTUREBEAT 
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Ukraine confirmed that it's using facial recognition technology from U.S. firm Clearview AI to identify Russian soldiers killed in combat. It uses that information to contact the fallen soldiers' families, according to Ukrainian Vice Prime Minister Mykhailo Fedorov. More: - Ukraine's defense ministry was recently given free access to Clearview's face recognition system, which scrapes from social media and the web to populate its database of 10 billion+ photos, including 2 billion photos from Russian social media service VKontakte.
- Its biometric technology matches photos of people to the images in the database. Ukraine's military is using Clearview's tech to locate Russian soldiers' social media accounts and contact their families to collect their remains, Fedorov told Reuters.
- Previously, Clearview CEO Hoan Ton-That said the company had offered Ukraine access to the controversial system.
- The AI technology could be used to identify undercover Russian operatives, people of interest at military checkpoints, and those who have lost their lives in the conflict; It could also help combat misinformation online and reunite refugees with their families, according to Ton-That.
REUTERS
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Mayo Clinic has launched a 20-week accelerator for AI startups that includes support from Google and Epic experts. The initial cohort includes four startups, which are the health data firm Cliexa, occupational health company Quadrant Health, data science specialist ScienceIO, and medical tech startup Sweer Medical. More: - The AI startup program, called Mayo Clinic Platform_Accelerate, provides access to Mayo experts in the regulatory, clinical, tech, and business domains.
- Its in-kind investments will range from datasets to validation tools.
- Google and electronic health records giant Epic are also contributing assistance. The focus is on validating the startups' AI models/programs and preparing them for clinical readiness.
- Mayo Clinic Platform will take an equity position in the startups, based on their most recent valuations or a convertible note or SAFE.
Zoom-out: - Here is how the initial cohort is using AI and other technologies:
- Cliexa is seeking to turn patient data into insights for people with cardiovascular and chronic conditions.
- Quadrant Health is developing a way to analyze electronic health records and patient messaging data to prioritize messages and predict patient harm.
- ScienceIO is working on data organization tools to streamline clinician workflows.
- Seer Medical plans to test home-based epilepsy diagnostics and management models and uncover digital biomarkers for predicting seizures.
HEALTHCARE IT NEWS
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Snap acquired the neurotech startup NextMind, developer of an augmented-reality headband that measures brain activity using sensors and machine learning tools. The Snapchat parent company could use NextMind's brain-computer interface and technology in its augmented-reality glasses. More: - NextMind's headband enables users to control certain functions on the computer with their thoughts, such as aiming a gun in a video game or unlocking a password to a smart device.
- NextMind's 20 employees will remain in France and work at Snap Labs. Snap plans to incorporate the technology into future AR smart glasses.
- While Snap's core business is based around social media and camera-based applications, it announced a new generation of Spectacles, its glasses to experience the world in AR, last year.
- NextMind has raised $4.5M at a $13M valuation to date, according to Pitchbook data.
- Snap also uses AI and machine learning algorithms to find drug dealing activity on its platform. In January, the company said AI helped raise its proactive detection rates by 390% over the year. Snap also uses machine learning to target ads and content to users.
THE VERGE
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Zest AI said it's bringing its AI-lending software to another 250+ credit unions across three states. The rollout is part of Zest's new partnerships with Minnesota Credit Union Network, Montana's Credit Unions, and the Wisconsin Credit Union League. More: - Zest makes software for credit underwriting. It says its AI models use thousands of data points to help lenders improve their decision-making.
- The company says credit unions that use its software are seeing 5x increases in instant-decision rates and up to 30% higher approvals "with no added risk."
- Los Angeles-based Zest recently announced a similar partnership with Cornerstone League, a nonprofit representing 500 credit unions in Texas, Oklahoma, and Arkansas.
CREDIT UNION TIMES
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🍋 FRESH FUNDING 🍋 - D-ID (Israel), AI-based platform to create videos of deceased relatives: $25M B led by Macquarie Capital.
- CoinRoutes (Miami, Fla.), algorithmic trading platform for digital assets: $16M B led by Ayon Capital, participation from Susquehanna International, Cboe Global Markets, Celsius, CMT Digital, Genesis Global Trading, Galaxy Digital, et al.
- YZR (Paris, France), AI to normalize data: $12M A from Nauta Capital, Orange Ventures.
- GGWP (San Francisco, Calif.), AI-powered games and content moderation solution: $12M Seed led by BITKRAFT Ventures, participation from Makers Fund, Griffin Gaming Partners, Sony Innovation Fund, Riot Games, et al.
- Gensyn (London, U.K.), distributed computing power platform: $6.5M Seed led by Eden Block, participation from Galaxy Digital, Maven 11, Coinfund, Hypersphere, Zee Prime.
- Modern Intelligence (Austin, Texas), modular AI to every maritime problem by performing real-time sensor fusion: $5M Seed led by Geoff Lewis, participation of Vine Ventures, Air Street Capital, Contrary Capital.
For the latest on AI startup funding and more in the VC community, subscribe to our newsletter Inside Venture Capital.
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- The U.S. Copyright Office turned down a second request to allow an AI to copyright a work of art, saying the image lacks the "human authorship" needed for that protection.
- Paige released an AI tool that assists pathologists in detecting breast cancer that has spread to nearby lymph nodes.
- This year's IoT World and the AI Summit will take place in Austin, Texas, on Nov. 2-3. Last year's event was held in Silicon Valley.
- Founder Shield has re-engineered the insurance experience with seamless digital applications and best-in-class customer service. Make the switch.*
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 |  | Beth is a writer and analyst at Inside.com covering artificial intelligence and daily tech news. Since starting work at Inside, she has covered various topics including virtual reality, drones, and e-commerce. Prior to that she was a public policy and investigative reporter for The Arizona Republic, where she won a Pulitzer Prize nomination and First Amendment Award for reporting on the rising costs of pensions. Reach her at Beth.Duckett@inside.com. |   | | Editor | Aaron Crutchfield is based in the high desert of California. Over the last two decades, he has spent time writing and editing at various local newspapers and defense contractors in California. When he's not working, he can often be found looking at the latest memes with his kids or working on his 1962 Ford. | |
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