• Posted 14-Dec-2021

EIT Digital boosting the delivery of digital innovations to the market

The EIT Digital Innovation Factory invests in pan-European entrepreneurial teams together with EIT Digital partners in five strategic focus areas: Digital Industry, Digital Cities, Digital Finance, Digital Wellbeing and Digital Tech.

Partners contribute technology, talent, business models and channels to the market to build deep tech digital innovations and new ventures. A great example of how this approach leads to successful outcomes is the partnership between Ai for Alpha and Lombard Odier Investment Managers.

The French financial software company and the asset management arm of the Swiss banking group, united in an EIT Digital innovation activity aimed at using artificial intelligence to assist asset managers in their investment decisions.

The collaboration started within the “Create the augmented asset manager using state-of-the art machine learning methods” innovation activity. In November 2020, the activity led to the creation and successful launch of the Ai for Alpha start-up.

The venture soon generated interest from investors, closing its first round of private funding from a group of French business angels. It also quickly signed first-class customers such as investment bank Société Générale, asset manager Homa Capital and wealth manager Meilleur Placement.

Investors and clients were impressed by how Ai for Alpha’s technology can quickly identify the key variables to be considered on an investment decision, helping asset managers to build better performing portfolios.

Lombard Odier acted both as a partner and first customer, teaming up with Ai for Alpha to test the solution internally within its own allocation process.

For Lombard Odier, another positive aspect of being part of EIT Digital’s ecosystem is access to talent. The EIT Digital Entrepreneurial Academy is a major source for deep-tech experts: students with in-depth knowledge of STEM subjects, but also with an entrepreneurial, can-do mindset.

Source: European Institute of Innovation & Technology (https://bit.ly/3sagjyO)