A Bristol tech business that aims to make artificial intelligence (AI) systems more transparent has been backed by tech investor Symvan Capital.
Tikos, based at the University of West England’s Future Space in Stoke Gifford, specialises in compliance and trust solutions for AI.
London-based Symvan says its investment, whose value has not been disclosed, comes at a "particularly strategic time” as the Ƶ government is preparing to introduce new regulation regarding AI at a time when more and more companies are looking to adopt the technology.
Symvan says many businesses are reluctant to adopt AI due to transparency concerns and the “black box problem”, where decisions made by AI can be hard to understand and explain. The investor says Tikos’ platform aims to make AI systems “more transparent and trustworthy for users, compliance teams, and regulators”.
Symvan said: “Tikos' proprietary reasoning engine, combined with its efficient 'expert-in-the-loop' system design, positions the company at the forefront of compliance-ready AI solutions.”
Tikos was founded last year by Mike Oaten, now CEO, and Dr Don Liyanage, now chief scientist and CTO. It is also working with Nvidia, Microsoft and Innovate Ƶ through their specialist business programmes.
Symvan investment manager Michael Theodosiou said: "We're excited to support Mike and Don in making AI systems trustworthy and compliant, addressing one of the most urgent challenges in AI. With over a decade of proprietary research, their ability to retrofit explainability and auditability into existing models is game-changing for regulated industries and high-stakes AI applications."
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