Microsoft Awards $3.5 million to Most Innovative Startups in AI

M12, Microsoft’s venture fund, announced the four winners of its global startup competition, Innovate.AI: Envisagenics, Hazy, ZenCity and Voiceitt. Together with Madrona Venture Group, Notion and Vertex Ventures, M12 awarded the four winners a combined $3.5M in venture funding and up to $2M in Microsoft Azure credits to help progress the future of artificial intelligence.

In October, M12 and its venture partners kicked off a global competition called Innovate.AI in a bid to find undiscovered startups around the world working to transform the future through AI. Hundreds of startups across North America, Europe and Israel applied to compete for their region’s respective prizes and demonstrate how artificial intelligence can advance how we live and work.

“From revolutionizing health practices to matching job seekers with skill-based careers, entrepreneurs across the globe captivated us with technologies that bring to life AI’s transformative potential,“ said Nagraj Kashyap, corporate vice president, global head of M12. “The number of impressive applicants we received painted a clear picture of how AI can be used to change the way we work, play and live, signaling a bright future for continued AI innovation.“

Winners of each region were awarded a total of $1M in venture funding from M12 and its partners and up to $500K in Azure credits. New York-based Envisagenics integrates AI and RNA therapeutics to unlock previously inaccessible cures for hundreds of diseases caused by splicing errors. London-based Hazy uses AI to automate data anonymization to help businesses share data more securely. Tel Aviv-based ZenCity uses artificial intelligence to analyze data from conversations on social media, city hotlines and other communication channels to surface trends in real time to city officials to improve citizen’s lives.

Another Israeli startup was awarded in AI for Good category. Voiceitt got $500K in funding and $500K in Microsoft Azure credits for best exemplifying the use of AI to improve society. The company builds speech recognition technology designed to understand nonstandard and dysarthric speech, assisting people who suffer from diseases and disorders to communicate.