UCL spin-out TurinTech.ai raises £1 million funding

Founded in 2017 by four UCL researchers from the Department of Computer Science, TurinTech.ai is a spin-out from University College London (UCL), home to the UK’s leading AI research center. The company is also an alumnus of Conception X – a venture builder and a deep tech incubator affiliated to UCL.

TurinTech.ai provides a platform that empowers industry professionals, software developers and AI engineers to autonomously evolve their software and AI systems, allowing for smart optimisation to be carried out at a scale never before achieved. The technology automates the software optimisation process, accelerating the path to improved software performance whilst significantly reducing resources (time and energy) and costs. TurinTech.ai’s platform is being used in the finance sector to optimise algorithmic trading, helping investors to make better trading decisions.

To date, TurinTech.ai has gained traction and support from leading cloud enterprises, including research grants and cloud resources from Microsoft, Google, and Amazon. These have been used to support the company to advance their research and development of various elements of their AI optimisation platform.

Dr Leslie Kanthan, CEO and cofounder, TurinTech.ai, said: “We are at the precipice of automated optimisation and TurinTech.ai is well-positioned for clients who wish to increase profitability and reduce costs. Our research has prompted interest in our commercial product from big tech companies, a multinational FMCG, fintechs, other startups and hedge funds to name a few.”

“We’ve built a close relationship with the team at Microsoft and this has been truly instrumental in the company’s success to date. As we look ahead, IQ Capital will be the perfect venture partner with its focus on deep tech portfolio and the synergy among them to take Turintech.ai to the next level.”

Rick Hao, principal, IQ Capital, said: “TurinTech.ai is one of the most promising startups to spin out of UCL that we’ve seen in recent years. The technology they are developing comes directly from the team’s years of niche research and experience in machine learning and software optimisation.

“While the research is niche, the application is not. The team have built a framework that can be easily customised to cater for their clients’ needs, across a wide range of industries and sectors. What unites all of IQ Capital’s portfolio companies is their potential for global scale, and TurinTech.ai is no different.”

An adviser to the company, Professor Andy Pardoe, Principal Director for Artificial Intelligence at Accenture, Founder of Informed.AI Group said: “The complexity of the algorithm powered by data is only starting to show its true dynamic and deep colours in the business world. As many more organisations transition from simple business logic to more personalised and complex algorithms, the need for computational optimisation becomes increasingly important. TurinTech are delivering an automated platform that delivers such optimisation across a number of different business domains, allowing firms to benefit from the best outcomes for themselves and their clients.”

Professor David Barber, Professor of Machine Learning and Director of the UCL AI Centre, commented: “The UCL AI Centre collaborates with leading technology firms, banks, major retailers, legal firms and regulators. Improving the performance of software in terms of execution time and memory usage is an important common problem and Turintech’s solution looks very promising.”

Turintech.ai is currently a resident in the Microsoft Reactor in London, recognising its potential to reach a global scale over cloud.