Benchmarking CrunchBase's Top 25 Artificial Intelligence Startups

iCarbonX, Anki, CARMAT, Arago, CloudMinds, Zero Zero Robotics, Preferred Networks, Inc., CustomerMatrix, Ozlo, and Scaled Inference are the top 10 Artifical Intelligence startups based on an analysis of CrunchBase data today.

Artificial Intelligence (AI) is one of the most diverse startup categories in CrunchBase, with 256 startups distributed across 225 categories and subcategories. 28 startups are combining AI and Big Data, 20 that are seeking to capitalize on AI with machine learning, and 11 concentrating on the intersection of AI and development tools and platforms. Startups applying AI to business intelligence, healthcare, e-commerce and enterprise software are also prevalent in the CrunchBase dataset.

Finding the Top 25 Artificial Intelligence Startups

Starting with the 256 AI startups as a base, companies who are no longer operating were first taken out of the data set.  These included those that had been acquired, exited via IPO or merger, or those that had closed down. Next , only those startups with three funding rounds or less were included. As the majority of AI startups are early stage investments right now, this thinned the list by 49 companies, yielding a net dataset of 207 startups.

Ranking the startups by total funding received is shown in the table below:

Source: CrunchBase

Conclusion 

The 256 AI startups tracked in CrunchBase  have generated a combined $1.62B in funding year-to-date.  The majority have received an initial funding round (133 or 51.9%), with 61 (23.8%) having received two funding rounds. Just 32 (12.5%) have received three funding rounds.  The majority of funding occurred in 2015 and continues to accelerate in 2016, showing how quickly investor interest in AI is growing.