Uppsala-based Scaleout Systems has secured a substantial seed funding round totaling €1.5 million (17.2 million SEK), attracting investors like Navigare Ventures owned by Wallenberg Investments AB, SEB:s Utvecklingsstiftelse, Almi Invest, and Uppsala University Invest. The company specializes in pioneering federated machine learning technology, enabling AI development without transferring sensitive data sources, such as private user data, medical images, or autonomous vehicle sensor data. This funding will bolster the company’s efforts to further develop their unique technology, expand market presence, and maintain a leading position in AI development, specifically focusing on advancing federated machine learning capabilities, ensuring data integrity, and respecting personal privacy.
Andreas Hellander, CEO of Scaleout Systems, explains: “This seed round is a important step for us. We secure resources not only to continue improving our technology but also to expand our market presence. Our goal is to continue to be at the forefront of AI development, especially in federated machine learning.”
With its groundbreaking technology, Scaleout Systems enables machine learning in cases where it is complicated, illegal, or inappropriate to transfer the data sources an AI model needs for training. Their solution is effective regardless of the type of training data, whether it’s private user data from mobiles, diagnostic cancer images from hospitals, or sensor data from autonomous vehicles.
Ebba Kraemer, former product strategist at Google and now commercial manager at Scaleout Systems, comments on the market: “We see an increased need among companies to enable AI on decentralized data sources. A primary driving force is the large amount of data collected locally, “on-edge”, in areas such as industrial IoT and autonomous vehicles. At the same time, it has become increasingly important to focus on personal privacy and data security, as individuals live more connected lives and the risks and regulations in data handling increase.”
With its ability to combine security and scalability with advanced AI technology, Scaleout Systems positions itself at the forefront of next-generation AI solutions, where users can benefit from machine learning without compromising data security and personal privacy.
Salla Franzén from Navigare Ventures emphasizes the strategic relevance: “Scaleout’s framework for federated machine learning is an important key to being able to do AI “for real”, and the team’s solid research background, technical knowledge, and business plan make us at Navigare Ventures happy to invest in them. We look forward to helping various industrial sectors and research groups solve an important part of scalable, future-proof AI.”
