Lumetry.AI is a Bucharest-based AI-driven data science startup, which provides deep learning for Big Data companies. The startup has been acquired by GTS Global Intelligence, a Romanian company specialized in software development and technology solutions. This news comes after in the first half of the year, Lummetry.AI declared a growth five times bigger than the previous year.
“The AI market is expected to grow in the coming years. There are few players on the local market and most of them are focused on the research area. We are one of the few players that have a go-to-market strategy for our products, one example being the development plans for the future AI-based physical security products,” shared Andrei Ionut Damian, co-founder and Chief Research Officer of Lummetry.AI.
Lummetry.AI offers tools like Big Data pattern identification, churn prediction, the propensity to fraud, predictive diagnosis, and transaction anomaly detection, prediction, and prevention. Amongst the markets they are addressing there are retail, healthcare, banking, and logistics.
The acquisition is backed by the Abris Capital Partners, an independent private equity fund based in Warsaw, looking to expand to Eastern Europe and help local players scale internationally. With this new step, the GTS Global Intelligence, part of GTS Global Technical Group, will continue to invest in Lummetry.AI’s research and development of Artificial Intelligence “engines”. It is preparing to launch a software platform for monitoring and managing physical security systems, Damian discloses.
“In a security market based on classic solutions, we are proposing a new dominant concept based on technology, a Physical Security as a Service system. We are developing proprietary software that includes IoT and AI solutions that overcome the challenges and limitations given by the security solutions based only on human guards. We are looking to expand the target market and further improve the features of our innovative software products,” Mihai Stanescu, founder and CEO of GTS Global Intelligence, says.
Damian shared with The Recursive that they will focus on AI-based modules, like perimeter violation, people counting, people presence identification, camera tampering, or crowd detection; as well as AI solutions like SEER, a predictive analytics engine based on both Machine Learning and Deep Learning, and ALLAN, an automated text analytics engine.
The two teams will collaborate and focus on two fields, one is traditional software solutions, while the other is AI engines and integration. Damian will be responsible for leading the AI team and they will also be looking at growing their technical and commercial teams and building a network of implementation partners.
Turning the focus on scalable solutions
Lummetry.AI’s business model was developed when the founder, Andrei Ionut Damian, decided to change the focus of the company he started back in 2007, titled Knowledge Investment Group, to AI predictive analytics and video analytics.
“I have always been fascinated by AI and its huge potential. In 2015, I took the decision to stop all endeavors in the area of business software development and focused on Data Science, thus migrating from a service-oriented business model to a product-oriented and more scalable one,” Damian says.
Now, the startup has two Managing Partners, Damian along with Cosmin Mihai Marinescu, which address different responsibilities. While Damian is an AI researcher, Marinescu looks after business development. Damian said that one of the biggest challenges was having to drop projects and refuse data science and similar software development service contracts to focus on products.
“AI-based software products are the future of the entire industry. For areas such as safety, security, retail, distribution, and many other industries where intelligent systems are required, we will see huge growth in the next three years,” Damian concludes.
He believes that the main growth driver is three-fold:
- “Need for more safety, security, to have more efficient processes and lower wastage;
- Adoption of AI that grows every day and already started with simple smartphones’ consumer applications, smart TVs, to name a few;
- Data as more digital data is collected and centralized,” he adds.
Stanescu says that in Romania AI technology is developing fast, with more processing power at affordable prices, higher accuracy of over 90%, and the integration is available for most of the existing security equipment. He believes that the trend is to upgrade from passive to active monitoring, from traditional solutions to preventive actions.
The Recursive summed up 15+ startup exits for the Southeast Europe tech ecosystem in 2021 so far if you want to continue reading other similar stories.
