Innovate UK awards Predictiva £0.3m to accelerate the delivery of their autonomous trading project, Investiva. This fully autonomous trading platform uses advanced AI models to improve financial-trading sector profitability by 80% and trader work-life balance by 90%.

As part of the UK Government’s research and innovation agency, Innovate UK has awarded funding of £344K to the Leicester-based AI startup, Predictiva. Inspired by arcade gaming strategies, the company’s platform, Investiva, uses a novel AI approach for more profitable and less risky trades compared with those used in buy-and-hold strategies and other baselines.

“Traders in the financial markets experience great emotional stress as markets rapidly fluctuate, and over 80% quit within the first two years of trading,” said Ashraf Attia, the CEO and co-founder of Predictiva. “The Investiva platform helps financial traders and investment managers to trade multiple financial assets using state-of-the-art Machine Learning algorithms while avoiding human emotional bias. In turn, the use of this innovative AI platform will improve the general wellbeing and quality of life of traders in the industry, and subsequently, reduce burn-out, increase productivity, and ease difficult working conditions.”

Predictiva forecasts this project will deliver a one hundredfold return on investment in year 5, along with an additional £8M R&D spend, an export value of £28M and 35 jobs created in England and Scotland by year 5.

The independent Kalifa Review, commissioned by the UK Treasury, states that the FinTech sector is now worth more than £11 billion a year to the UK economy [1]. The Government’s Innovation Strategy, published in July 2021, identifies AI as one of the key areas where the UK has globally competitive R&D and industrial-strength that will transform our economy in the future [2]. Together, the FinTech sector and AI, as strategic priorities for the UK Government, will be vital for the country’s post-COVID-19 and post-Brexit recovery in delivering the benefits of financial innovation.

“This Innovate UK funding award is another great validation of the creative edge we have at Predictiva,” said Ashraf. Our team of Data Scientists and AI Researchers are keen to utilise this grant to accelerate the development of our Investiva platform. Solving complex fintech problems creatively is what makes us tick, and this additional funding will enable us to do more of that, more quickly.”

About Predictiva

At Predictiva, we are determined to solve the most challenging optimisation dilemmas in the financial markets, to deliver predictable profits while minimising risks. Using state-of-the-art Deep Reinforcement Learning algorithms, we use AI to redefine Financial Intelligence and make advanced AI available to everyone.

Key Predictiva Milestones

• May 2021: Predictiva’s first funding round resulted in investment from 7 Angel Investors and a post-money valuation of £4.9m.
• Featured in The Next Web (TNW) as one of the top 50 data-driven startups in Europe.
• Won the IBM Best Machine Learning Project Award at the University of Edinburgh.
• Won the Regional Award of the Tech Nation Rising Stars competition.
• Developed strategic partnerships with leading technology providers including Microsoft, Amazon Web Services (AWS), and IBM and leading Universities such as The University of Edinburgh.

Predictiva media contact: Ashraf Attia | Co-Founder & CEO | akotb@predictiva.co.uk

About Innovate UK

Innovate UK is part of UK Research and Innovation, a non-departmental public body funded by a grant-in-aid from the UK government. We drive productivity and economic growth by supporting businesses to develop and realise the potential of new ideas, including those from the UK’s world-class research base.

Discover more: UK R&I

[1] 26 February 2021 UK’s global fintech leadership bolstered by new review

[2] 22 July 2021 New plans to put UK at front of global innovation race