Artificial intelligence: the investment of 2017 and beyond

The rise of artificial intelligence (AI) has, for the last couple of years, dominated headlines as technologies associated with AI advance and appetite grows exponentially for AI products. Key market players in industries too many to mention are looking towards AI innovation to stay ahead of their competitors and gain market share, seeing AI as the catalyst for success. This appetite only serves to make AI start-ups a more attractive proposition to the global VC community. AI spending is forecasted to grow from $640m in 2016 to $37bn by 2025, according to market research firm Tractica. Tractica's research director, Aditya Kaul, told website Datanami that cases like image recognition, algorithmic securities trading and healthcare patient data management, "have huge scale potential", as well as in areas such as business services, consumer products, industry (industrial robotics), advertising, finance, media and defence.