Not only does generative AI spark revolutionary changes with applications growingly spanning across all industries, but it has also become the first solution that companies choose to build up their competitiveness.
Startups that drive global business transformation are increasingly utilizing generative AI to develop new products or services as a way to grab the attention of angel investors and enterprise users. To allow more enterprises to see what Taiwan-based startups have accomplished with generative AI, DIGITIMES and Taiwan Tech Arena (TTA), a flagship startup program funded by the National Science and Technology Council (NSTC), held Enterprise Connect - Generative AI Startup Pitch Day on July 23, 2024, with technical support from Amazon Web Services (AWS).
The event gathered promising startups to present their generative AI solutions and attracted a great number of corporate venture capital and new business development specialists who hoped to connect with the startups through the one-to-one matchmaking activity and thereby build a solid foundation for their companies' long-term development.
According to Yi-Bin Chen, Director, Integrated Marketing Department, DIGITIMES, startups are playing a growingly important role in the global marketplace. Because of this, CES has an exhibition area specially designed for startups to demonstrate their promising potential. TTA led 96 startup teams to participate at CES 2024 and organized the TTA Taiwan Pavilion, where the teams showcased their innovations and successfully grabbed the attention of venture capitalists from all over the world.
Today everyone is talking about AI. AWS is among the few cloud computing pioneers that are capable of providing total AI solutions. AWS has been supporting and helping startups achieve great achievements over the long run.
Andrea Hsu, Director General, Department of Academia-Industry Collaboration and Science Park Affairs, National Science and Technology Council (NSTC), noted that by establishing TTA in 2018, NSTC aims to bridge Taiwan-based startups with the international community to thereby drive innovations and developments across many industries. As of today, TTA works with close to ten accelerators to bring resources and technologies to support startups' early-stage development.
More than 900 startup teams have flourished thanks to TTA. Today, AI has become the engine that drives digital transformation for global industries. At CES 2024, AWS invited the teams for a visit to the Amazon fulfillment center to witness how AI was used to process shipments. That was very inspiring to the teams that use generative AI to develop innovative services. It is hoped that bridging startups with enterprises will build positive momentum for Taiwan's industry upgrade.
Chester Hsieh, Head of Taiwan Sales, Head of Strategic Programs, Hong Kong and Taiwan, AWS, commented that AWS has been working with startups for years. AWS is adopted by more than 80% of the unicorns in the world including Netflix, Airbnb, and Uber as well as Taiwan-based KKBOX and 91APP. Among those that endeavor in AI, 96% have chosen AWS. Since 2000, Amazon has been utilizing AI technologies.
AWS offers a wide range of high-performing foundation models (FM) from leading AI companies for startups to choose from based on their products and services. AWS was pleased to support TTA and DIGITIMES in holding the event connecting startups with enterprises.
Moreover, in recent years, Amazon has been actively utilizing generative AI to enable new services. For example, it is used to collect and sort customer comments at Amazon's online bookstore to help consumers make purchase decisions. Furthermore, generative AI is also used for Alexa, the voice assistant that many people are familiar with, and for shipment schedule prediction and package arrival notices for orders placed on Amazon Pharmacy. All of the aforementioned innovative services rely on the robust computing power and advanced machine learning technologies provided by AWS.
Eye-catching generative AI solutions from startups
Nine startup teams supported by TTA and AWS Joint Innovation Center (JIC) participated in Enterprise Connect - Generative AI Startup Pitch Day. Based on their products or services, they were divided into different categories including audio tech, RPA software, energy, no-code AI, cyber security, martech, and law tech.
In the cyber security category, Cymetrics, a subsidiary of OneDegree Global, provides a complete range of cyber security assessment and inspection products and services. For example, its LLM-based cyber security inspection service helps users improve the visibility of vulnerabilities and manage risks with more agility and flexibility.
Authme is an authentication solution built on AI and machine learning to enable security, convenience, and regulatory compliance for corporations. Authme has developed authentication, face recognition, and biometric liveness detection systems that safeguard against identity frauds and Deepfake attacks while reducing inspection costs and enhancing user experience.
Amid the rising popularity of robotic process automation (RPA) software, IsCoolLab with years of experience in professional software development introduced Robotiive. The patented AI-enabled solution integrates and modularizes a variety of automation capabilities to allow users with no coding experience to easily automate their process in any use scenario.
In support of energy efficiency initiatives, PurismEV developed a proprietary AI-based solution that increases EV range by 40% and extends battery life 2.3 times to address EV owners' range anxiety. The solution is being used in delivery trucks, ride-sharing electric motorcycles, off-road electric bikes, and race cars.
With user experience being a top priority, DeepWave, in the audio tech category, is committed to AI-enabled voice recognition solution development and application. It provides customers with an all-in-one digital audio processing solution for voiceprint recognition, active noise reduction, noise cancellation, and voiceprint comparison.
Its solution has been used in smart manufacturing, digital content processing, music entertainment, and education. In the law tech category, Legal Tech, founded by a group of lawyers, presented a one-stop contract lifecycle management solution, LegalSign.ai, based on generative AI. Encompassing contract lifecycle management, electronic signing, and AI legal assistant, the solution improves efficiency and minimizes risks for corporate legal teams, allowing them to deliver greater business value.
To help circumvent the current AI talent shortage, many companies have developed no-code AI solutions to lower the barrier to AI adoption. Chimes AI introduced Tukey, a solution that allows factory workers to extract data and build AI models using the automatic model packaging function and connect with enterprise information services in a snap.
Tricuss presented an enterprise-level LLM-based solution to improve efficiency for operations such as document integration, automated sorting, and data entry as well as knowledge management and consolidation. Featuring a simple user interface and guaranteed accuracy, the solution boosts productivity for all kinds of corporate functions.
BigGo, a star that shines brilliantly in the martech sector, operates the biggest e-commerce product search and price comparison website in Southeast Asia and Taiwan. It debuted two new AI tools in 2024. One is BIRSE, an image search engine that searches for products based on images. The other is the BigGo Description Generator, which generates accurate product descriptions using AI.
The final section of the event was a one-to-one matchmaking activity aimed at connecting startups with prospective partners who can help them with fundraising, market expansion, and technology development. The activity marked a perfect ending to the Enterprise Connect - Generative AI Startup Pitch Day.
DIGITIMES, TTA, and AWS representatives at Enterprise Connect - Generative AI Startup Pitch Day. Credit: DIGITIMES