Yasmina Darveniza, an investor at leading PropTech VC Round Hill Ventures, says AI can have a major impact in real estateThe amount of venture capital money flowing into UK artificial intelligence start-ups hit a record-breaking $3.2 billion in 2019, making it one of the hottest sectors to be in.

This financial boost, along with bolder algorithms, Big Data and better infrastructure, is bringing founders andfunders to the AI equation. Yet according to a recent report, 40 per cent of European firms classified as AI start-ups do not actually use artificial intelligence.

Is AI then just a fad or is it worth the hype?

AI makes it possible for human capabilities to be undertaken by technology at scale. While rules-based programs have existed since the 1950s, AI nowadays usually relates to machine learning providing systems withthe ability to automatically learn from data and improve from experience without being explicitly programmed.

This can be applied to a wide variety of prediction and optimisation challenges, from predicting when patients will get sick to teaching self-driving cars to understand their surroundings.

To utilise this technology, start-up founders need access to talent around applied AI, access to large and proprietary data training sets, and domain knowledge to provide deep insights into the opportunities within an industry. Founders need to identify a sizeable target market and understand the problem theyre trying to solve.

I see no better target market for AI applications than real estate. Not only is it the worlds largest and most important asset class, but also one of the last industries to adopt technological change.

A great example is Israeli start-upSkyline AI,which takes the guesswork out of investmentdecisions by training its technology on the mostcomprehensive data set for US multi-family assets.

Mining data from over 130 sources and analysing10,000-plus data points on each property forthe last 50 years, its tech estimates asset value,predicts future performance and discoversinvestment opportunities.

AI can also optimise both property developmenttime and cost. Nordic start-upSpacemakerAIisa development tool used to maximise the potentialof building sites. Property professionals canuse it to generate and assess billions of possiblesolutions to multi-building developments inhours analysing designs for a range of differentparameters such as sun exposure, noise pollutionand apartment size.

The company has partneredwith leading developers in Europe includingSkanska, OBOS, AF Gruppen and Bouygues tohelp them reduce critical planning time whileincreasing sellable space by up to double digits.

Using Big Data and machine learning algorithms,Iberian start-upCASAFARIenables a higherlevel of efficiency and transparency in assetmanagement. The software provides users withdownloadable historical and descriptive datasets for all property cases and is working tobuild the cleanest, most complete database in itsgeographies. Asset managers can use it to setdatadrivenrental prices and identify the best time tosell assets.

AI has almost unlimited potential across multipleindustries and especially real estate. Not everysolution requires it, but knowing how, when andwhere to effectively use the technology can be akey lever for start-ups and businesses alike.

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Artificial Intelligence: worth the hype? - BusinessCloud