iGenius, the artificial intelligence startup founded by the Albanian immigrant in Italy, Uljan Sharka, announced on Tuesday that it is seeking an investment worth 650 million euros, a funding round which would give the company a valuation of 1.7 billion euros.
Founded in 2016 in Milan, Uljan Sharka and iGenius was announced as the winner of the ICT Innovation of the Year award at the 6th edition of the Albanian ICT Awards.
As they are seeking to expand in the European artificial intelligence sector and compete with big names like Mistral in France or DeepL in Germany, iGenius has so far secured investments worth 1.05 billion euros from Angel Capital Management and Eurizon Asset Management, a unit of Intesa Sanpaolo bank.
Allianz, Aon, Enel and Intesa Sanpaolo are some of iGenius clients and Sharka believes his company will reach 20 million euros of yearly revenue by the end of 2024.
At the start of the month, iGenius launched “Italia”, an open-source AI model (LLM) trained exclusively on Italian language and is able to understand linguistic and cultural nuances.
The company believes that centralized and closed AI models cannot be compatible with regulated sectors such as finance or governance.
This investment round would catapult iGenius to positioning as an unicorn of the most elite artificial intelligence startups in European scene and the World.
“Today, we take a giant leap forward with additional capital to drive our AI advancements in regulated sectors. Our goal is to make data human, redefine the future of work, and close the skills gap, empowering individuals and businesses to reach new heights,” said Sharka.
iGenius boasts an international team operating across North America and Europe, with offices in New York and Milan as its headquarters.
Who is Uljan Sharka?
Uljan migrated to Italy at a young age in 2008 as his passion for technology led him to start studying computer science and work at the same time to financially support his studies.
Amongst many challenges he founded iGenius, a startup that would grow rapidly in the Italian tech scene. In 2018 iGenius received an investment of 7 million dollars, the highest ever given in Italy by a group of angel investors.
iGenius has been rated among the best international startups by Facebook, Google, Web Summit, Startup Grind and TechCrunch.
/PCWorld Albanian
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