Trusted and transparent AI for mission-critical decision-making at the edge
Playa Vista, CA – PiLogic Inc., a pioneer in “exact AI” – mathematically precise, expert-guided artificial intelligence – announces today the closing of a $4 million seed round to expand its footprint in the aerospace and defense industries to upgrade rules-based systems with the power of exact AI. Scout Ventures and Seraphim Space led the round, which enjoyed significant participation from Sovereign’s Capital, and investment from Flex Capital, FN Fund, and superangel Gokul Rajaram.
PiLogic builds exact AI models. On key problems, its platform is faster and more accurate than Generative AI Large Language Models (LLMs), and PiLogic’s engine uses drastically less compute power. The company’s unique approach applies a range of AI techniques: logical inference, probabilistic inference, search, and machine learning. The models incorporate first engineering principles and expert knowledge directly into the decision-making process. This approach does not require huge data sets nor expensive hardware such as Graphics Processing Units (GPUs).
An early predecessor of PiLogic’s inference engine has been benchmarked as scaling dramatically better than competing techniques. Incorporating dramatic new advances, PiLogic’s latest inference engine is much more powerful yet, and allows the company to address complex problems that other inference engines simply cannot. What’s more, PiLogic’s cutting-edge technology allows exact AI to be deployed on remote devices like satellites without the need for additional compute resources.
PiLogic’s first two models address significant challenges in the defense and space industries:
Future use cases include supporting autonomous flights, automatic threat prediction and response, diagnosing and predicting electric power system failures on aircraft and spacecraft, other onboard diagnostics, radar tracking, and sensor fusion. PiLogic’s cutting-edge models and inference engine are designed for mission-critical scenarios where precision is paramount.
PiLogic is using its funds to grow its core team, build out its product suite, and support early customers with mission-critical challenges in two of the most important domains of today: aerospace and defense.
PiLogic was founded by a team of leading entrepreneurs and inventors: Mark Chavira, Johannes Waldstein, and Geoff Bough.
Mark Chavira, Founder and CTO, is an AI expert with decades of real-world experience. Mark spent 12 years at Raytheon designing avionics operating systems; earned a PhD in probabilistic inference from UCLA; applied his research to problems at NASA; and spent 13 years at Google, where he became an Engineering Director, led an advanced AI/ML team of 125, and owned products generating billions in annual revenue in ad targeting.
Johannes Waldstein, Founder and CEO, co-founded and led five startups over the past 20 years with a focus on data science and AI innovations. His latest achievement was founding Fan.AI, an AI-driven adtech company, working with Coke and Pepsi on sports attribution, and was ultimately acquired by Spiqe.com in 2024.
Geoff Bough, Co-Founder and CRO, has over 15 years of experience in business development, sales, and marketing. He was employee # 8 at FanDuel, where he played a key role in the company’s growth. He has since held executive positions at Flutter, Caesars, and Triller, where he facilitated a $4B merger with AGBA.
Johannes Waldstein, Founder and CEO PiLogic, said: “We are incredibly excited about the potential of exact AI to transform industries at the point of need, where precision is critical. We believe that many of these critical applications, especially in defense and space, can’t feasibly be addressed by GenAI. And that is what we are here to solve. This funding will allow us to scale our team and expand our platform, bringing our innovative technology to more commercial and government clients.”
Brad Harrison, Founder and Managing Partner of Scout Ventures, said: “PiLogic’s lightweight, efficient, and exact inference engine will help chart a new course for AI adoption in industries like Aerospace and Defense. At Scout, we are excited by the opportunity to support a team and technology that will ultimately enhance the efficacy of the critical systems supporting no-fail missions.”
Andre Ronsoehr, Partner Seraphim Space, added: “PiLogic’s approach to high-stakes decision making on the edge has the potential to transform the space industry. It is a sector still rife with rules-based-systems and humans in the loop, often for the lack of viable alternatives. PiLogic will change that and enable satellite and spacecraft operators to realize the full benefit of AI. Notably, their approach is both differentiated and counterintuitive in a world currently obsessed with generative AI. And I very much like that.”
Media contacts
PiLogic Inc.
Johannes Waldstein
johannes@pilogic.ai
Seraphim Space
Clotilde Gros / George Esmond / Harry Handyside
Scout Ventures
Zach Beecher
Notes to Editors:
About PiLogic
PiLogic is building vertical specific and scalable Bayesian models that utilize the world’s most advanced inference engine. These models solve use cases for customers that so far had to rely on rules-based-systems. PiLogic’s initial focus is on aerospace and defense, where the company has significant early traction with models improving radar systems, onboard electrical and mechanical diagnostics, and sensor fusion challenges.
About Pilogic’s Bayesian Networks
Pilogic’s technology builds on the work of Bayesian networks invented by Judea Pearl at UCLA. Several members are credited with applying its principles to artificial intelligence, including Adnan Darwiche, the most advanced academic in probabilistic interference and automated reasoning work as advisers for PiLogic. This approach has allowed PiLogic to develop an inference engine – the AI component within a system that applies logical rules data to make deductions, predictions, or decisions – that is orders of magnitude faster than anything else in the market. The defining feature is that PiLogic’s model can solve numerous complex problems that other inference engines simply cannot, via an expanded Bayesian treewidth, all at significantly less compute power and able to run on the edge with no additional hardware.
Treewidth plays a significant role in the analysis of algorithms, particularly in the context of parameterized complexity. Currently, Bayesian networks tap out at a treewidth of 36, regardless of compute power. Traditional AI models with limited Bayesian treewidth struggle to accurately model complex relationships between variables like satellite positions, velocities, and collision risks. PiLogic’s model can continue to solve into the treewidth of hundreds. This has significant applicability to space situational awareness (SSA) and satellite constellation management as operators track thousands of objects in orbit, including satellites, debris, and potential hazards. This opens new possibilities, addressing such problems in space that require exact answers with tree widths that extend beyond a width of 50. A selection of Marks’s papers on the subject can be found here: https://dblp.org/pid/86/6262.html
About Scout Ventures
Scout Ventures is an early-stage venture capital firm focused on dual-use technologies that solve National Security challenges. Backing mission-driven founders at the forefront of innovation, Scout provides capital, strategic support, and operational expertise to help scale transformative companies. Our investment areas include space & aerospace, autonomy, quantum, AI/ML, and advanced materials. Scout Ventures is driven by a mission to make the world a better, safer place by fostering innovation and promoting collaboration to address future challenges and advance frontier technologies to build a more resilient, secure, and prosperous future.
Further information is available at https://www.scout.vc/
About Seraphim Space
Founded in 2016, Seraphim Space is the leading global SpaceTech investment firm. It has pioneered ‘SpaceTech’ as an investment category, having launched both the world’s first private and first public SpaceTech-focused funds.
Through its combined offering of early and growth stage funds, Seraphim Space provides the fuel to help the sector’s most ambitious entrepreneurs skyrocket – from pre-seed to pre-IPO.
Across its operations, Seraphim Space is backed by leading space corporations and international space agencies, including the UK and European Space Agencies, Eutelsat, NEC and SKY Perfect JSAT. With its current investment portfolio of 38 companies across its core North American, European and Asian markets, Seraphim Space is the most prolific investor in SpaceTech globally.
Further information is available at www.seraphim.vc
