Singapore-based hyperlocal AI startup Nextbillion.ai has been awarded on Wednesday as the winner of Slingshot 2020, a deep tech startup competition organized by Enterprise SG.
Nextbillion.ai received the Startup SG grant prize of SGD 200,000 (USD 150,000) plus a cash prize of SGD 50,000 (USD 37,000), thanks to its AI-powered mapping solution NBmaps, which features functions such as routing, navigation, direction, and distance matrix. The firm aims to deliver AI-led hyperlocal solutions for businesses.
The award comes after the firm completed a USD 7 million Series A funding round co-led by Lightspeed Venture Partners and Falcon Edge Capital in July.
“The real work starts now and our aim is to build a global deeptech software as a service (SaaS) company out of Singapore. Location will and always be at the heart of Nextbillion.ai and we hope to enable enterprises across the world with the best ecosystem possible to run their businesses,” said Ajay Bulusu, co-founder of the firm.
Ten startups spanning across five sectors also bagged an SGD 50,000 (USD 37,000) startup SG grant each. Among them, Crayon Data and KeyLess Technologies in digital solutions, consumer products, and services; GyroGear in healthtech, biotech and medtech. ProAgni and eggXYt were also awarded in food tech and agritech, together with Lauretta.io and TransferFi in urban solutions, sustainability, and energy.
Two London-based startups, medical device startup GyroGear, and biometric multi-factor authentication platform KeyLess Technologies, were also recognized as runner-up and second runner-up, respectively.
Slingshot 2020 was held as part of the Singapore Week of Innovation & Technology (SWITCH) and Singapore FinTech Festival (SFF). All 100 startup finalists across the world had two minutes to pitch their ideas to the industry leaders during the virtual finals.