Vlad Andriescu
The report had two objectives: the first was to identify and map artificial intelligence start-ups in the region, and the second objective was to collect information about their evolution starting from 2022 (development stage, attracted or targeted funding rounds and future goals).
More than half of the AI start-ups in the region were launched after 2020
In this edition, more than 150 start-ups using AI from Romania were identified, the number increasing from 100 to 150 compared to last year, and 100 start-ups from the SEE.
More than half of the identified start-ups were launched after 2020. Also, 10% of the start-ups in the previous edition of the report exited the market, more precisely, under ten entities.
A third of survey respondents said their main goal for this year is to attract more customers. Other important objectives of founders are to attract a new round of investment, to increase their team, to enter new markets or to launch services and products.
The biggest challenges of AI start-ups
More than half of the responding entrepreneurs have already attracted investments, and a third of the already funded start-ups obtained rounds between 500,000 and one million euros. More than 10% attracted amounts between 50,000 and 100,000 euros. Less than one third of participants did not attract investment.
The biggest challenges startup founders face is that they can't find the right employees, they can't attract the financing they need, and they can't secure the cashflow they need to operate. They also consider it difficult to expand internationally and they find the bureaucratic process difficult in Romania and in other countries where they are present.
„Even in the face of adversity, Romanian AI/ML startups continue to secure substantial funding rounds. As per a recent study by Activize, of the €69.2M accumulated by Romanian startups in H1 2023, the three highest contributions came from AI/ML enterprises: FlowX with a €35M Series A, Kubeark with a €2.7M pre-seed, and Techcelerator graduate Veridion with a €5.5M late seed round. This strongly suggests that companies in this sector, including those established as recently as 2020 like Veridion, are successfully reaffirming their worth”, said Cristian Dascălu, Managing Partner of Techcelerator and Partner of GapMinder.
For this survey carried out during October 2022 – January 2023, 52 start-ups responded, around 80% of them from Romania, and the rest from Greece, Croatia, Bulgaria, North Macedonia and Turkey.
