Andrew Williamson, Investment Director at CIC a Cambridge-based investor in technology and healthcare companies,says: “PROWLER.io is a developing a brand new strand of AI that can be applied to a wide range of intractable problems. It is rare to see such as leap forward in technology, but it is based on a rich legacy of academic work that has been nurtured in Cambridge for over 10 years. Chairman Professor Carl Rasmussen literally wrote the book about probabilistic modelling!”
PROWLER.io, a company developing a world-leading, artificially intelligent decision making platform based on interpretable principles of mathematics and learning.
Interactive and adaptable
PROWLER.io's platform enables users to observe and predict the way agents – such as vehicles, drones, robots, characters in games and even people – interact in complex environments, thus providing users with an understanding of the millions of micro-decisions that can occur in dynamic systems.
The platform combines three core mathematical areas: machine learning, probabilistic modelling and game theory to provide new insights into virtual and physical environments. Its agent-based machine learning methodology is more interpretable than traditional deep neural nets and its multi-agent systems are more adaptable and strategically interactive than decision-tree based systems.
Many AI applications
PROWLER.io’s platform has many potential uses but is initially focusing on game development, autonomous vehicles (AVs), drones, robotics and smart cities.
In game development, PROWLER.io’s platform replaces the use of hand-crafted rules, which are time consuming, expensive and restrictive for decision making. This produces games that feel open and responsive and engage players in novel, more personalised ways. In addition, PROWLER.io’s agents can be designed to perform repetitive tasks thousands of times faster than manual testers, thus significantly reducing game development costs and time to market.
It is impossible to program AVs for every eventuality they will face on the roads. PROWLER.io’s technology uses probabilistic modelling to enable a self-learning car to “understand” itself and its environment. Multiple principled learning approaches are used to teach it to drive, together with multi-agent systems to ensure that it operates safely alongside other road users.
Smart cities
In smart cities, the platform optimises fleet planning and management. This ensures that real time demand for AVs matches supply, vehicles are close by when needed, routes are planned efficiently, congestion is reduced and negative environmental impacts are minimised.
Tackling the big challenges
Andrew Williamson, Investment Director at CIC, who is joining the Board of PROWLER.io commented, “PROWLER.io has assembled a world-class team of researchers to tackle some of the most intractable problems of our age.
"It is hugely exciting that the company is able to capitalise on the expertise in probabilistic modelling, principled machine learning and game theory available in Cambridge. The combination of PROWLER.io’s team and technology applied to the important problems they are solving provides a significant commercial opportunity for the company.”
Vishal Chatrath, CEO of PROWLER.io added, “This investment allows us to expand our world-leading team of academics and developers, enhancing our research bandwidth and accelerating our technology into the market.
"As a team, we will use the funding to take the business to the next stage and we will continue to solve some of the world’s hardest machine learning problems.”
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