Atos has teamed up with French-startup, DreamQuark, to launch a digital solution for banks and insurers dedicated to socially responsible investing "SRI". The launch of the new Sustainable Investment Brain platform coincides with the publication of proposed new European rules around transparent artificial intelligence, with which it complies. DreamQuark is a financial services focused, AI technology specialist and a member of the Atos Scaler accelerator program. Sustainable Investment Brain utilises leverages a variety of financial data, including ESG (environmental social and governance) information provided by Atos to provide insights on potential customers and the most suitable assets and investment products. There is growing interest in responsible investing whilst ESG is an also an area of scrutiny for financial services institutions.

Vivacity Labs will introduce more sensors across central London locations as Transport for London (TfL) seeks to better understand road use in the capital. London-based Vivacity was co-founded by Mark Nicholson, Yang Lu and Peter Mildon in 2015. The company, in which Tracsis plc has a 24.6% shareholding (see Tracsis on schedule after H1 and work back), has developed sensors that use artificial intelligence to automatically count road users and pedestrians and classify modes of transport. All video captured by the sensors is processed and discarded within seconds, meaning that no personal data is ever stored. Since 2018, the sensors have been trialled by TfL at two locations in the city.

A week ago, we covered the announcement that Capita's start-up development unit, Capita Scaling Partner (CSP) had entered into a new partnership with visual analytics provider Dragonfly AI, and all with a little bit of help from TMV. Capita and Dragonfly AI were brought together via the TechMarketView Innovation Partner Programme that we launched last year, the latest addition to our UK Tech SME programme series. The aim of the Programme has been to find innovative UK tech SMEs and help them partner with our large enterprise technology clients and, in doing so, help UK tech SMEs reach client markets that would normally be out of their reach – exactly as Dragonfly AI is doing with Capita. Originally conceived at Queen Mary University of London, Dragonfly AI is a tool designed to help brands win the attention of consumers as they interact with marketing materials, ad content, products or even packaging. The particular pain point here is that consumers are becoming increasingly time poor, and with the world moving at an ever-faster pace, and as more and more (digital) content gets generated, it is becoming increasingly difficult for brands to get noticed. The biggest challenge for small start-up businesses like Dragonfly AI, is despite however good your technology is, it can be hugely difficult getting in front of large potential clients at the necessary level of seniority.