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- #21: Revolutionizing Tech: JustPaid's API, Egrobots' Crop Detection, and Replit's AI Assistant Lead the Charge | OneMoreThinginAi
#21: Revolutionizing Tech: JustPaid's API, Egrobots' Crop Detection, and Replit's AI Assistant Lead the Charge | OneMoreThinginAi
#21: Latest edition of One More Thing in AI Newsletter.
Renjit Philip
April 14, 2024
Edition #21: One More Thing in AI- JustPaid's API, Egrobots' Crop Detection, and Replit's AI Assistant.
Date: 14-Apr-2024
Hi reader,
Thank you for subscribing to the One More Thing in AI Newsletter.
Specially curated for Startup founders and Business Leaders like you who want to get smarter on AI in less than 5 minutes.
In this focused edition, we are going to present a few AI startups that caught my eye. Why? Gets you an idea of the art of the possible in the field of AI, especially in your organizations. It might also inspire you to start something on your own!
In case you want to me to stress test your AI startup ideas or discuss AI initiatives in your business:
I hope you enjoy reading this edition, and as usual, keep on learning and applying AI.
Best,
Renjit Philip
In this edition:
JustPaid's New API Unlocks Effortless Business Payments – Powered by AI
JustPaid, a fintech, has launched a new AI-powered API that automates the billing and payment process for businesses.
🤖 Functionality: The API allows for the automatic tracking of product usage and generation of invoices, enabling easy creation of customer profiles, processing payments, and managing customer communications within existing systems.
💸 Simplified Payment Process: The platform securely saves customer and bank details, and processes both one-time and recurring payments, handling the full workflow from tokenization to processing to notifications.
🌍 Future Expansion: Initially focused on ACH payments within the US, JustPaid plans to expand internationally and add more features, aiming to become a fundamental payment infrastructure globally. I am surprised that it does not use the recently released FedNow system.
💡 Why is worth paying attention?: Following its launch, JustPaid secured over $4 million in funding and is supported by top investors, including Y-Combinator and others. Also, because of its international expansion aspirations. B2B payments is an interesting area of focus and is mostly done with the help of manual cheques or slow bank transfers in most countries. Big scope for improvement!
Detect Crop Diseases Early with Egrobots' Cutting-Edge AI in MENA
🌍 Imagine a world where crop diseases are detected before they can wreak havoc on our food supply. That world is closer thanks to innovative startups like UAE-based Egrobots.
🤖 Technological Leap in Agriculture: Egrobots, an agritech startup from the UAE, is pioneering the use of robotics and artificial intelligence to preemptively detect crop diseases. This groundbreaking approach is part of their broader strategy to enhance agricultural productivity and sustainability in the MENA region.
📱Innovative Tools for Farmers: The startup has introduced three main services:
🌱 Egro Scout: A service employing autonomous robots to navigate through farms and collect vital data, which is then analyzed to offer detailed crop health reports and recommendations.
🔍 Egro Scan: A mobile app providing instant disease detection and tailored advice to small farmers, which has already attracted over 13,000 users in seven countries.
📊 Egro Care: A comprehensive farm management app that integrates all farming data, making it easier for farm owners to make informed decisions and improve farm efficiency.
🌐 The startup is part of the Mohammed Bin Rashid Innovation Fund (MBRIF) accelerator program. Additionally, a key partnership with Greener Crop, a farm management firm, is set to expand their reach in the UAE and Saudi Arabia.
Takeaway:
🚀 With robots that can see in the dark and an app that acts as a farmer’s best friend, stay tuned as Egrobots transforms agriculture and increases food security in a region that desperately needs it.
Alibaba-Backed ZhipuAI Accelerates Towards OpenAI's Sora With New Funding Boost
🚀 Ever wonder how the AI race shapes up when giants like Alibaba back ambitious startups? Let’s dive into the recent strides by ZhipuAI.
🌟 ZhipuAI’s Leap: This Chinese startup, backed by Alibaba, is on a rapid mission to enhance its text-to-video AI technology. The trigger? OpenAI’s launch of Sora. The prize is presumably the massive global movie making / OTT content creation market.
📈 State-Backed Boost: Amidst additional and newfound support from Chinese state funds, ZhipuAI’s journey has just got rocket-fueled!
🔗 Industry Impact: The implications of such advancements extend beyond simple technology upgrades; they promise a reshaping of content creation and media consumption. Also, the world better watch out for deepfakes and disinformation at scale (if things are not tightly managed!). But that analysis is for a different edition of this newsletter.
Takeaway:
It is highly unlikely that Sora will be allowed to “sell” its offering to the Chinese market- that is where tools like ZhipuAI come in. Imagine the large TAM of Chinese movie industry. A lot of the “text to video” startups would love to take a bite of that market!
As per Statista: “China retained its position as the world’s second-largest film market in 2023, demonstrating a steady upward trajectory. The country's cinema ticket sales is about 55 billion yuan”. Juicy market indeed!
Revolutionize Coding: Replit Debuts AI-Powered Assistant for Browser IDEs
🚀 Imagine having an AI-powered coding buddy that offers real-time fixes and suggestions while you code. That’s the groundbreaking reality introduced by Replit with their latest innovation! We covered Devin in a previous edition>>.
🖥️ Replit Teams Unveiled: Browser-based IDE startup Replit has launched a new product called Replit Teams, like GitHub’s Copilot. It provides real-time AI assistance to developers, suggesting fixes and improvements directly in the coding environment.
🧠 Smart Integration: The AI agent embedded within Replit Teams requires no prompting from users; it proactively jumps in with code fixes and efficiency improvements. This feature ensures that developers remain in the driver’s seat, accepting or rejecting suggestions as they see fit.
💡 Boosting Productivity: Designed to feel like coding alongside another programmer, Replit Teams aims to enhance developer productivity. To learn more about the concept of pair programming click here>>.
🌐 Ease of Access: What is Replit? It is a browser based environment for coding. Replit’s browser-based setup means developers can start coding immediately with minimal setup, unlike traditional desktop IDEs that can be cumbersome to configure.
Takeaway:
With Replit Teams, the future of coding looks not only more collaborative but also smarter than ever before! Another big productivity enhancer for startups and large companies alike. Will these kinds of AI powered tools reduce the demand for developers? Remains to be seen.
I think the co-pilot approach that Replit is using will find more developer acceptance and is unlikely to replace a developer at the moment. One thing is sure, there will be many more startups created with fewer engineers.
This Indian Startup Just Raised $5.5M to Help Salespeople Sell Smarter with AI
🚀 Picture this: You’re a salesperson stepping into a high-stakes meeting. Your potential client is well-informed and expects deep insights. How do you keep up? Enter SiftHub, a startup that’s transforming how sales professionals prepare and engage.
🌐 SiftHub’s Innovation: This India and US-based AI platform is designed to help salespeople access the most up-to-date company and product information from a single hub, simplifying how they prepare for and conduct meetings.
💡 Seed Success: SiftHub recently raised a robust USD 5.5 million in seed funding from heavyweight investors like Matrix Partners India and Blume Ventures, with participation from the founders of Razorpay.
🛠️ Tools at Your Fingertips: The platform utilizes large language models that are fine-tuned with industry-specific knowledge, offering semantic search features. Semantic search uses the intent and contextual meaning of search terms to generate more relevant results.
🧠 Takeaway: As the expectations for sales teams evolve, sales personnel require deep technical and product knowledge. SiftHub’s AI solution helps them focus more on building relationships rather than managing information.
Pigment Secures Whopping $145M for AI-Driven Business Planning in Mega French Tech Round
🚀 Imagine an enterprise software company that not only doubles its customer base but also triples its revenue in a single year. That’s Pigment for you, making waves with a massive $145 million funding round!
🌟A Parisian Surprise: Pigment has secured one of the largest funding rounds in recent French tech history. A stunning achievement given the current downturn in large funding rounds.
📈 Investor Confidence: Iconiq Growth leads the charge in this Series D round, with backing from existing investors like Sandberg Bernthal Venture Partners and new players including Meritech and Felix Capital. Their bet? Pigment’s continued explosive growth.
💼 What does it do? Pigment provides a robust business planning tool that integrates with existing company data systems, allowing for sophisticated financial forecasting and strategic planning.
🤖 AI Integration: Not just a planning tool, Pigment has evolved to include AI features. This enables users to interact with their data using natural language queries to get insightful answers. See a common thread with the other AI startups? It is all about Retrieval Augmented Generation.
🚀 Beyond Finance: Initially tailored for CFOs and finance teams, Pigment now also caters to HR, sales, and supply chain departments, becoming a crucial tool for cross-departmental collaboration.
💥 Takeaway: In the face of stiff competition from legacy giants like Oracle and SAP, Pigment is entering a massive TAM. With its fresh capital, Pigment is poised to redefine business planning across industries.
AI Video Wizardry: $8M Raised to Animate Social Media Like Never Before
🌉 San Francisco Innovation: Higgsfield, a startup based in SF, has secured a substantial $8 million in seed funding to enhance its video creation tools specifically for social media marketers. That’s the vision Higgsfield is bringing to life with their innovative app, Diffuse.
🎥 Specializing in Short Form: Unlike competitors aiming for lengthy AI-generated films, Higgsfield focuses on empowering social media marketing with quick, engaging content in short form video.
📲 Mobile Mastery: Their Diffuse app stands out by allowing users to create lively animated videos directly on mobile platforms—ideal for social media marketing on TikTok, YouTube Shorts, Instagram Reels and so on.
🛡️ Safeguarding Creativity: With an emphasis on cartoon-style animations, Higgsfield prioritizes preventing the misuse of AI for creating deepfakes.
🌍 Global Learning: Initially launched in select markets like South Africa, Canada, India, and the Philippines, Higgsfield’s focus is on gathering insights and ensuring responsible usage of its video tools. Smart move!
That is it for this edition of the Newsletter. If you subscribe to our email edition, you can read this Newsletter before non-subscribers, and it will stay in your mailbox for future reference. Subscription has its value!
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