“AI” is the buzzword of the year, overpowering blockchain as the latest obsession within almost every industry. 

What a lot of people fail to realize is AI and blockchain are intimately intertwined, and it all relates to the quality of data necessary to power the “New Internet.”

In an effort to educate their second cohort on the role blockchain plays in AI and the data that feeds into it, startup incubator AI Forge hosted an “Introduction to AI and blockchain” masterclass at the London ExCeL last February 13.

“They’re obviously two huge powerhouses of technology, blockchain and AI, and it’s my belief that actually, there should be a confluence of those two technologies,” AI Forge Founder and CEO Craig Massey told CoinGeek.

“First of all, there’s a lot of fake news and all the various negatives in terms of AI, and I think blockchain sorts all those issues out. But more importantly, investors want to hear that,” he said.

“So in terms of valuation, in terms of strengthening these companies, if we can get a few of those guys awake to the idea of using blockchain as part of their solution, that’s a better story when we go out to investors,” Massey added.

The masterclass was led by two expert presenters, Nav Kumar of Astroware AI and Richard Boase of BSV Mint, who took turns walking the startups through the basics of blockchain and citing use cases of how blockchain and AI are used together.

“Blockchain can improve AI in a multitude of ways, as we saw in terms of use cases where what people can do is, they can own their own data,” Kumar said.

“But in this case, what you’re doing is you have a handle of your data depending on the service. You could actually share your data for AI to then process your data in a privacy-preserving way, to then make recommendations that are something that you want to consider, so you are in control of what is being recommended to you,” he explained.

Boase is very passionate about NFTs and pointed out that everything can be an NFT—a map, cars on the map, our work products, and even the output of AI can be NFTs.

“The advantage of this is in a Bitcoin-centric web or an internet built on Bitcoin, everything that you produce can be tokenized and owned and transferred and traded, and so that would be an NFT,” he said.

“That just extends so far on to executable files and tokens and stuff like that, so really, the possibilities are endless. And that becomes super exciting,” he added.

A total of 33 startups participated in the masterclass both in-person and virtually, with plenty of Q&A throughout the session. The active participation and positive feedback from the startups indicated that the content was a hit and gave them something new to super-power their projects.

“It was amazing, actually, today with the masterclass with Nav and Richard, we had great insights from blockchain and AI,” shared Sreenath Rangapuram, founder of Ride Commerce, a climate ESG mobility startup.

“From that masterclass, I think we got the insights from how blockchain can be implemented for Ride Commerce with the data sets from the road behaviors as well as from the trucks and vans,” he said.

Katrien Grobler, founder of AI Kat, an ad agency enabling small businesses to access branding and content through AI, said she believes blockchain will keep AI honest.

“I think that AI is going to shape the search of the future for marketing, but blockchain is probably going to empower search and allow us to track where the information is coming from. So that was, to me, the biggest learning and takeout from today,” she told CoinGeek.

“I think the privacy that blockchain will give customers and their own data is something which customers don’t always understand…but actually, it’s all about security. And I think it’s really important to change the narrative from fear to this is actually a safe place,” Grobler added.

Looking at things from more of a finance industry angle, Joseph-Francisco Zubizarreta, founder of Atera Analytics, is focused on enhancing the levels of security for payments, transactions, and savings with his startup. His main takeaway from the masterclass was how to bring down costs by integrating blockchain, in particular BSV blockchain, with its incredibly low transaction fees.

“In order to be a successful startup, we have to justify even ten times the level of improvement, not only marginal improvements compared to regular new businesses, but we wanted to bring down costs for transactions,” he said.

“And at the same time, leverage blockchain in order to have a faster platform in order to do all the processing, much more efficient and reduce any levels of risks for both consumers and financial players,” Zubizarreta added.