Healthcare, COVID-19 response dominate CB Insights’ 2021 AI 100 startup list; Korean edutech startup Riiid gets a spot

Artificial Intelligence (AI) is transforming the world and lives. Leading the AI revolution are tech startups across the globe. CB Insights, the US-based business analytics platform and global database that provides market intelligence on private companies and investor activities, has come out with its 2021 list of promising startups in the AI area.

CB Insights unveiled the winners of the fifth annual AI 100 recently, which includes promising private AI companies from 12 countries, driving innovation across 18 industries and a broad range of cross-industry applications. 2021’s winners are working on solutions including AI transparency, climate risk, virus modeling, health, COVID-19 solutions, education, and more.

Startups from 12 countries get named in the list

In this year’s list, healthcare has been a highly represented core industry, with eight selected companies focused on dental insurance, surgical tech, clinical trials, etc. Also, emphasis was on COVID-19 related solutions with a selection of companies that have developed new products and features directly in response to the pandemic to mitigate its impact and help clients adapt. For example, US-based CB Insights, released SARS-CoV-2-related imaging datasets publicly to improve understanding of the virus and its impact on human cells. US company CB Insights, released a simplified version of its photo documentation product for construction companies to track job sites remotely. And Canadian startup CB Insights, launched COVID-Net, a suite of neural networks for Covid-19 detection and risk assessment in chest radiography.

The CB Insights research team selected the AI 100 from a pool of over 6,000 companies based on several factors, including patent activity, investor quality, news sentiment analysis, proprietary Mosaic scores, market potential, partnerships, competitive landscape, team strength, and tech novelty. The CB Insights,, based on CB Insights’ algorithm, measures the overall health and growth potential of private companies to help predict a company’s momentum.

“This is the fifth year CB Insights has recognized the most promising private artificial intelligence companies with the AI 100, and this is one of the most global groups we’ve ever seen. This year’s cohort spans 18 industries and is working on everything from climate risk to accelerating drug R&D,” said CB Insights CEO Anand Sanwal. “Last year’s AI 100 companies had a remarkable run after being named to the list, with more than 50% going on to raise additional financing (totaling $5.2B), including 16 $100 million+ mega-rounds. Many also went on to exit via M&A, SPAC, or IPO. As industry after industry adopts AI, we expect this year’s class will see similar levels of interest from investors, acquirers, and customers.”

Besides healthcare, early-stage innovators, top-funded companies, and 12 unicorn companies also made it to the AI 100 list. While 64% of the selected companies are headquartered in the US, Eight of the winners are based in the UK, followed by 6 each in China and Israel, and 5 in Canada. Other countries represented in this year’s list include Japan, Denmark, Czech Republic, France, Poland, Germany, and South Korea.

Riiid gets recognized for its remote learning solution

Korean edutech startup Riiid has achieved a place on the global list for its AI-based education solutions. The only other edutech company on the list is US-based ELSA, an English pronunciation coaching service.

Talking about Riiid’s inclusion in the list, YJ Jang, co-founder, and CEO of Riiid, said,“Riiid’s inclusion on the list validates our drive to apply AI to create a personalized learning experience and empower global education players to rethink traditional instruction. We were founded to make exponential changes in education, and we are indeed pioneering a new paradigm. The coronavirus pandemic created a perfect storm for Riiid to provide its proprietary AI technologies to meet the demand for the highest quality remote learning solution.”

Riiid, based in South Korea, features AI technology that analyzes student data and content, predicts scores and user behavior and recommends personalized study plans in real-time to help students achieve their learning potential. Riiid offers a mobile test prep app for a popular English proficiency exam that is used by more than two million students in Korea and Japan and reached No. 1 in sales among education apps in those markets. In addition, Riiid Labs, the company’s global arm based in Silicon Valley, has partnered with education companies including Kaplan, ConnecME, Grupo INICIE, and Casa Grande to combine Riiid’s AI technology and the content provided by those companies, creating personalized learning mobile apps in Korea, Egypt, UAE, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Brazil, Colombia, and Puerto Rico.

To generate research and attract top AI talent to education, last year Riiid successfully launched the inaugural Riiid AIEd Challenge, carried out on Google’s Kaggle platform. More than 3,390 teams from 90 countries participated — the most of any 2020 Kaggle algorithm competition hosted by a business entity. Riiid also hosted an AI in education workshop at the 35th annual AAAI conference with speakers including Thomas Frey, DaVinci Institute; Elizabeth Bailey Kozleski, Stanford Graduate School of Education; Martha Kanter, CEO of College Promise and the former U.S. Under Secretary of Education for the Obama Administration; and Kumar Garg, Schmidt Futures Foundation.

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