[AI Revolution](105) Autonomous Driving Data Leader 'AIMMO'... Continuing DX Expansion

AI Data Solution Company AIMO CEO O Seung-taek
Emerging in Autonomous Driving Market... "Creating Solutions for Snow and Rain Conditions"
Steadily Targeting Global Market Through 5 Overseas Subsidiaries

Startup AIMMO is making a name for itself in the autonomous driving and smart city markets by providing AI data solutions and signing contracts with autonomous driving-related companies such as Magna International, Bosch, and Continental. Recently, it has been solidifying its position in the AI data market by unveiling an integrated management solution necessary for AI data management.

Oh Seung-taek, CEO of AIMMO / Photo by AIMMO

This year at CES 2024, AIMMO announced its AI solution ‘4Core’. 4Core is a solution that manages the entire cycle from data collection, refinement, processing, to evaluation in an integrated manner. It features reduced time required for data management, cost savings, and minimized error probability. Through this, optimized data can be applied across all industrial fields including autonomous driving and robotics. Recently, in an interview with Asia Economy, CEO Oh Seung-taek expressed confidence in the 4Core solution, stating, "There is no company that provides solutions covering the entire cycle." At CES 2024, AIMMO achieved contracts with over 20 companies. CEO Oh also expects the number of contracts to increase as discussions on proof of concept (POC) evaluations are underway.

He explained how data processed through AIMMO’s solution is used in autonomous driving simulations. For example, based on footage of a car driving in good weather, physical parameters related to road slipperiness during rain or snow are incorporated to create different driving environments. By generating various driving conditions at the same location, researchers can consider what responses are necessary in case of accidents during autonomous driving.

CEO Oh said, "If hallucinations occur in autonomous driving, it leads to accidents," adding, "Therefore, when regulations and requirements create high entry barriers, no one can easily follow."

AIMMO holds 50 domestic patents and has filed 3 international patent applications (PCT) for global business. Additionally, by providing software-driven solutions in the AI data market, it offers specialized solutions tailored to specific industrial sectors. Based on this, AIMMO’s client companies have recorded an average annual growth rate of over 24% for four years since 2020, with last year’s sales increasing by 66% compared to the previous year.

CEO Oh’s realization of the growth potential in the vision AI market came from Professor Fei-Fei Li’s ‘ImageNet Project’ at Stanford University. Vision AI is a technology where computers recognize and analyze images or videos to derive information. He learned that nearly 50,000 workers organized and classified 1 billion images for labeling work that enables computers to recognize unstructured data. Later, in 2016, he co-founded the startup ‘Bluewhale’ with six founding members to create a data labeling platform. At that time, they participated in the ‘Pangyo Zero City’ project at the Gyeonggi Autonomous Driving Center, providing autonomous driving domain experience and vision AI data.

Recognizing that the accuracy and quality of data critically affect AI model performance, CEO Oh changed the company name to ‘AIMMO’ in 2019, combining AI and Ammunition, and transitioned it into an AI company. AIMMO means ‘accurate training data is the ammunition for AI.’ CEO Oh said, "I realized that for researchers to use data well, it must be collected according to standards," adding, "I thought it was necessary to curate (classify and distribute) only the required data through labeling to make it easier for researchers to use."

AIMMO is expanding its business areas beyond autonomous driving into digital transformation (DX) fields such as smart cities, smart factories, smart logistics, and smart defense. It currently operates overseas subsidiaries in Canada, the UK, Germany, Vietnam, and the United States. CEO Oh stated, "Starting next year, we plan to launch application programming interface (API) services and software as a service (SaaS) in the North American market."