Element AI Raises Historic $102M USD ($137.5M CAD) Series A Funding Round from DCVC and Leading Global Institutions

Funding to create new jobs, accelerate enterprise AI adoption and create the world's most powerful AI platform
Tencent Holdings Ltd. and Hanwha Investment make significant investments
MONTREAL, QUEBEC, June 15, 2017: Element AI, an artificial intelligence company that delivers groundbreaking AI solutions, announced today it has raised $102M USD, representing the largest Series A funding round for an artificial intelligence company in history. With this funding, Element AI will accelerate its capabilities and invest in large?scale AI projects internationally, solidifying its position as the largest global AI company in Canada and creating 250 jobs in the Canadian high tech sector by January 2018.

China's Tencent Holdings Ltd. (0700.HK) is a significant investor in Element AI, part of a broader strategy of Tencent to grow its expertise in artificial intelligence in order to serve the needs of its diversified businesses -- a strategy that took shape with the establishment of AI Labs in April 2016. AI Labs' main areas of focus are content, social, online games and cloud services. The other significant investor from Asia is South Korea's Hanwha Investment, the investment arm of Hanwha Group.

Element AI plans to open in Japan, Korea and Singapore to expand in the Asian market, with its first Asia office in Japan during the third quarter to target the local market. The second office will be opened later in the year in Singapore, which will also serve as a regional hub for Southeast Asia.

Element AI solves impossible problems for global organizations that urgently need to use AI in combination with their proprietary and valuable data to leap ahead of their competitors. Serial entrepreneurs Jean?Franc?ois Gagne? and Nicolas Chapados, Real Ventures and Yoshua Bengio, a co?father of deep learning technology, co?founded Element AI in October 2016 to empower industry with the massive scale of academic AI innovation Bengio was driving at the world?leading Montreal Institute of Learning Algorithms (MILA).

Together with MILA, one of the three leading centers of AI research in the world, Element AI pioneered a unique, non?exploitative model of academic cooperation they have now replicated to many other institutes. This model provides Element AI with insight, talent, and cutting?edge research that matches or exceeds even the largest tech corporations' reach and budgets.

Data Collective (DCVC) led the funding round with participation from Fidelity Investments Canada, Hanwha Investment, Intel Capital, Microsoft Ventures, National Bank of Canada, Development Bank of Canada (BDC), NVIDIA, Real Ventures, and several of the world's largest sovereign wealth funds. In addition to laying the groundwork to hire hundreds of top researchers, this new funding will enable Element AI to aggressively expand on a global scale focusing on AI?powered solutions for their customers in cybersecurity, intech, manufacturing, logistics and transportation, and robotics.

"Artificial Intelligence is a 'must have' capability for global companies," said Element AI CEO Jean?Franc?ois Gagne?. "Without it, they are competitively impaired if not at grave risk of being obsoleted in place. Seasoned AI investors at DCVC understood this, and supported us to democratize the AI firepower reserved today for only the largest of tech corporations. Intel, Microsoft, and NVIDIA, as pioneers and champions of AI hardware and software, likewise understand that their businesses flourish as every company is empowered with world?class AI. This is why these leaders have backed us with the world's largest Series A round ever for an artificial intelligence company. This historic round will help Element AI deliver profoundly powerful AI platforms for all, not just the few."

"Tencent is actively pursuing investment opportunities in AI and innovation globally," said Hongwei Chen, Executive Director of Investment and M&A at Tencent Holdings. "We are excited to partner with Element AI and Real Ventures, and look forward to seeing breakthroughs in AI technology and applications that help improve people's lives."

"The most serious problems facing global industry and government today involve too much complex and rapidly changing data for the cognitive capacity of even large numbers of human experts working together," said DCVC Managing Partner Matt Ocko. "These groups ? and the customers and citizens they serve ? need intelligent systems that can work in concert with them to field that scale and complexity. We're proud to back Element AI and their team of world?class researchers and engineers, who are already solving multiple global?class problems."

"Intel is all?in on AI," said Naveen Rao, VP & GM of Intel's Artificial Intelligence Products Group (AIPG). "In addition to hardware, we're committed to developing the software ingredients necessary to accelerate complex, data?intensive processes. Such an endeavor means investing in the best minds in the world and Element AI has the intellectual horsepower to help us all advance artificial intelligence like never before."

"Element AI is doing amazing work enabling AI for a wide variety of industries, leveraging NVIDIA's deep learning platform," said Jeff Herbst, Vice President of Business Development at NVIDIA. "Element AI will bene it by continuing to leverage NVIDIA's high performance GPUs and software at large scale to solve some of the world's most challenging issues."

The securities offered have not been and will not be registered under the U.S. Securities Act of 1933, as amended, and may not be offered or sold in the United States absent registration or an applicable exemption from the registrations requirements of such Act. This press release shall not constitute an offer to sell or the solicitation of an offer to buy the securities in any jurisdiction.