Riding the artificial intelligence wave

Artificial intelligence (AI) has been the talk of the start-up town for a while now. E-commerce major Flipkart plans to create an AI unit called AIForIndia. Online transportation network company Ola recently rolled out an AI-based real-time tracking mechanism for passenger safety. But Unicorns and established players aren't the only ones bullish on this technology. There is a clutch of newbie ventures that have focused their business models primarily around AI.

From leveraging artificial intelligence for those in search of a life partner to deploying it for curating gourmet and healthy food menus, start-ups are utilising the much-in-demand technology in the most unique ways.

AI offers tremendous growth potential for start-ups, with private sector investment scaling up over the years. As per industry estimates, more than $150 million has been invested across 400 AI-focused start-ups in India over the last few years. Meanwhile, private sector investments in AI in the US have been $18 billion. In Europe, they have totalled $2.6 billion and approximately $1.8 billion in Israel in the recent past. 

Despite AI-focused investments in India appearing minuscule in front of the western countries, there is scope for growth for start-ups, say experts.

Sanmati Pande, founder and CEO, Growfitter, says, “AI helps in scaling up a business quickly irrespective of geographical boundaries. AI tools help to organise the raw data, which is compiled in specific formats and with deep learning techniques, provides detailed insights and statistics to stakeholders. AI-based start-ups are witnessing a keen interest from investors. AI can produce precise results with minimal resources and the scalability of the business can be achieved through an asset-light model with the help of AI techniques, which play a vital role for investors.”

Fitness and health-focused start-up Growfitter has built an AI-based preventive healthcare platform which is used by fitness centres, insurance companies and corporates. Their AI-powered app helps in tracking a customer's workout time and assess the fitness level, which helps in delving into the customer's health behaviour and generating a health score based on a proprietary algorithm. “Earlier, gyms witnessed renewal rates of around 25% and an average customer attendance of 100 days in a year. We have boosted the renewal rate to three times the current trend, while attendance has gone up to 175 days,'' says Pande.

A start-up like Betterhalf.ai is built around leveraging AI to help professionals find their life partners through compatibility scores based on multiple relationship dimensions and their interactions on the product. This marks a shift from traditional matchmaking which has been designed around physical, educational and caste-related traits of an individual. “We capture through AI an individual's personality in different relationship personality dimensions like emotional, social, intellectual, physical and values. We further curate through AI up to 10 relevant matches for them, cutting down 80% of the time they would have otherwise spent through traditional matchmaking,'' says Pawan Gupta, co-founder and CEO, Betterhalf.ai.

Meanwhile InnerChef, which curates ready-to-eat meals, healthy eats, gourmet experiences, indulgent desserts and detox cleanses, uses AI in building customised menus, for sales forecasting, capturing food trends and for consumer food recommendations.

Rajesh Sawhney, founder and CEO, InnerChef, says the venture has grown by 100% in the last one year. “We have plans to accelerate growth further and achieve three times revenue growth. We are currently in the National Capital Region, Bengaluru, Hyderabad and Mumbai. We are looking to expand our shared kitchen platform in new geographies this year.”

Growfitter, says Pande, witnessed attained $4.5 million in gross revenues in FY18, a 300% jump. “In the current fiscal, through the launch of our AI-based Incentivised Wellness Programme, our annualised revenue run rate for FY19 shall be $10 million. We have already launched operations in Indonesia and shall enter other South-East Asian countries soon.”

Betterhalf.ai, which has over 11,000 users across India, North America, Europe, South Africa and the UAE, is aiming to attain a user base of one million in the next two years. “10% users invite other users to the product. We expect this to shoot up to over 30% as the product and the AI matching algorithm becomes even more effective,'' says Gupta.

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$150 mn – Invested across 400 AI-focused start-ups in India over the last few years