From left: Shawnee Kwon of Munis, Sophia Jagannathan of Metashop, Emiri Grimes of Yuimedy, Megha Agarwal of Fundamento, Hyejun Lee of Kai Health, Jamie Jeong of Generate and Eiko Nakazawa of Ikura.
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Yesoogle’s fund for female founders in the Asia-Pacific region has selected its first batch of startups in the hot field of artificial intelligence, who will receive an injection of cash and guidance.
The fund, called Google for Startups Women Founders Fund, was launched in August and is managed by Google for Startups, the startup support arm of the tech giant. Each startup will receive $100,000 in financing without giving up equity, as well as mentorship and networking support.
Mike Kim, Google’s Singapore-based Asia-Pacific head for startups, exclusively revealed forbes asia First batch of women-founded startups:
perineum ,India): Founded by former Morgan Stanley investment banker and Oxford graduate Megha Agarwal, the three-year-old startup uses generative AI to automate customer inquiries. “Megha recognized two things: One, most of the people calling have similar problems, so a lot of this could be automated. And second, she also realized that the pressure felt by customer service workers around the world is leading to unhealthy mental health problems,” Kim said in a video interview.
Mike Kim, Google’s Asia-Pacific head for startups.
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ikura ,Japan): The two-year-old startup provides unique, out-of-the-box travel recommendations using AI. “Instead of everyone going to Shibuya or everyone going to that one temple in Kyoto, [cofounder Eiko Nakazawa] I felt that not only was it not environmentally friendly, but most of the time people were also unaware of other things available,” says Kim. “Not only will this help small businesses, but it will also help the environment because not everyone will go to some of these places [tourist] Spots.”
kai health ,South Korea): Founded and led by Heejun Lee, who studied medicine at Seoul National University, Kai Health analyzes embryo images and clinical data to improve pregnancy success rates for in vitro fertilization (IVF). Uses AI to do this.
metashop ,India): The one-and-a-half-year-old startup can create a 3D model of a product using video, allowing companies to provide more detailed product images for online sales.
Munis ,South Korea): Its app, called Miracle Night, uses AI to analyze health data to generate personalized sleep-inducing sounds to help improve sleep quality.
Yuimedi ,Japan): Led by a former McKinsey consultant, Yuimedi uses AI to clean medical data so healthcare providers can better use their vast troves of data. AI algorithms can process data in medical records, analyzing patterns to recommend treatments.
generate ,South Korea): Co-founded by Jamie Jeong, who holds a doctorate from Caltech, Zenerate uses AI to quickly generate building designs. Kim says Zenret’s designs could help increase the supply of affordable housing in South Korea, where there are concerns about a housing shortage as developers are hesitant to launch projects due to rising costs.
The seven were selected from hundreds of applicants. Kim had told earlier forbes asia The fund will focus on startups in AI right now because the technology is growing rapidly, so it is important for underrepresented minorities and women to be part of the growth process and not left behind.
“We focused on AI for this particular fund because it spans so many different industries,” he says. “In the future, whatever technology or industry we work with, whether it’s healthcare, finance, even hardware, there will be some use of AI to make it more efficient and improve the user experience. Will have a share.”
AI features prominently in this year’s Forbes Asia 100 to Watch list. Of the 100 small companies and startups included in the list, 25 use AI technology. These include Abacus Digital in Thailand, which has developed an AI-powered app to provide instant loans to mostly underbanked customers; Singapore’s Bot MD, whose AI-powered chat assistant can help medical professionals look up information, monitor their patients, and provide real-time alerts about their health; and NeartheLab in South Korea, which uses AI and autonomous drones to monitor wind farms.
