Southeast Asian nations have seen a surge in startup activity in sectors such as Fintech, Edtech, etc. Artificial intelligence (AI) has also garnered huge interest in recent years. Scientific and engineering advancements in data collecting and aggregation, algorithms, and computer processing capacity have allowed scientists and engineers to make significant steps toward building artificial intelligence.

The United States, which pioneered several applications, and China, which is still a distant second but rapidly catching up, are the two primary worldwide centres of AI development. ASEAN lags behind, yet each member state has AI activities. Singapore has made the most significant strides, but there are also encouraging early indicators in Malaysia and Vietnam. Although the technology industry is naturally at the forefront of adoption, AI technologies are being applied across a variety of areas, including transportation, financial services, health care, and media.

Some of the prominent Investors that have been investing in AI based startups in SEA region are listed below:

• 500 Startups: The US-based 500 Startups was created in 2010 by entrepreneurs Dave McClure and Christine Tsai. 500 Durians, the region’s most active tech investor in 2017, is 500 Startups’ regional affiliate in Southeast Asia. ‘500 Durians’ has invested in the internet, deep learning, and several of the region’s unicorns. Innovocall, Esports Players League, RaRa Delivery, Fairbanc and Conicle are just a few of the firms they backed with over $454 million in financing.
• Agaeti Venture Capital: Agaeti Venture Capital was established in 2018 and currently has 13 investors. It is a seed-stage venture financing business that invests in technology-enabled enterprises such as ProSpark and Waste4Change. Its core market is Indonesia, with an eye on development throughout Southeast Asia.
• AngelCentral: AngelCentral was launched in 2018 and now has a total of nine investors. It provides quality deal flow, syndication services, and educational opportunities for angel investors in Southeast Asia via selected pitch sessions and angel education programmes. They just invested in RaRa Delivery’s seed round of US$0.8 million at COVID-19.
• Atlas Venture: Atlas Venture is an early-stage venture finance company focused on health sciences innovation. It was created in 1980 and now has 564 investors. Their latest funding includes a US$1 million startup investment from Right-Hand.
• Cathay Innovation: Cathay Innovation is an early-stage venture financing firm that provides a platform for digital entrepreneurs to operate across three continents: North America, Europe, and China. It was started in 2015 and now has 99 investors. They have a business relationship with Cathay Capital Private Equity.
• East Ventures: East Ventures was created in 2010 and has 400+ investors. It is a venture firm that offers early-stage seed finance to entrepreneurs in Southeast Asia, USA, and Japan. During the COVID-19 epidemic, they invested in BukuWarung, Nusantics and Waste4Change.
• Enterprise Singapore: Enterprise Singapore is a government organisation that promotes company development by assisting startups in a variety of categories, including their stage of growth, industry, and international markets. It was started in 2018 and now has 24 investors.
• Expara IDM Ventures (EIDMV): EIDMV is one of Singapore’s top incubators and mentoring programmes for early-stage digital media firms. They have subsequently invested in sixteen firms, including Novocall’s initial round of US$0.5 million at COVID-19. It was started in 2003 and now has 17 investors.
• Gaw Capital Partners: Gaw Capital Partners is a worldwide private equity firm concentrating on real estate markets in greater China and areas with high barrier-to-entry. They backed SensorFlow’s US$8.3M Series A round during the COVID-19 outbreak. It was started in 2005 and has 10+ investors.
• Openspace Ventures: Openspace Ventures was launched in 2014 and has 50+ investors. Openspace Ventures invests in Southeast Asia’s early-stage technology businesses, often at the Round A or B stage. Their current portfolio spans consumer and business-to-business technology and totals more than US$225 million in assets. They invested in Igloo’s Series A round of US$8.2 million and SensorFlow’s Series A round of US$8.3 million, respectively.
• Partech: Partech was created in 1982 and now has 400+ investors. Partech is a worldwide investment business with over $1.3 billion in capital available to help entrepreneurs at the seed, venture, and growth stages. The investments vary from $200K to $50M in a variety of technologies and enterprises.
• Prasetia Dwidharma: Prasetia Dwidharma is an early-stage technology venture capital firm based in Southeast Asia. They gave initial money to ProSpark and Webtrace in April 2020. It was started in 2008 and now has 40 investors.
• SGInnovate: SGInnovate was founded to assist entrepreneurial scientists in developing ‘technology-intensive’ businesses based on scientific research. It was launched in 2016 and has invested in almost 71 companies. Over the previous three months, they participated in Moovaz’s US$7 million Series A round, UNL’s US$2 million seed round, and Right-US$1 Hand’s million seed round.
• Susquehanna International Group of Companies (SIG): The Susquehanna International Group of Companies (SIG) operates on a worldwide scale, with an emphasis on trading and market making, institutional sales, research, private equity, venture capital, and investment banking. It was started in 1987 and now has 50+ investors.
• Wavemaker Partners: Wavemaker Partners manages $180 million in assets and invests in high-impact automation, analytics, and intelligence. Wavemaker Partners is a Los Angeles-based early-stage venture funding business with dual offices in Singapore and Los Angeles. They handle over 300 portfolio firms and have a total of over $265 million in assets under management. It has currently invested in businesses such as Musiio, a Singapore-based music firm that leverages AI to analyse and listen to large amounts of music produced daily in order to rapidly evaluate, classify, and search out songs of interest for business partners.

Though there is an increase in investment and attention being paid to artificial intelligence, it is crucial to remember that the technology is still in its early stages, with much potential for improvement in terms of trustworthiness, accountability, and ethical elements. However, working on such hard problems also means it is more relevant to the market and has investor’s attention.

Startups working in AI or have an element of AI in their business model have huge scope in the present industry scenario. Building solutions driven by AI is more attractive to investors and has huge potential. Startups can explore how to leverage these trends in their own business and make themselves more relevant to investors.