Back in December 2020 we covered the launch of a new kind of smartphone app-based search engine, Xayn.
“A search engine?!” I hear you say? Well, yes, because despite the convenience of modern search engines’ ability to tailor their search results to the individual, this user-tracking comes at the expense of privacy. This mass surveillance might be what improves Google’s search engine and Facebook’s ad targeting, to name just two examples, but it’s not very good for our privacy.
Internet users are admittedly able to switch to the U.S.-based DuckDuckGo, or perhaps France’s Qwant, but what they gain in privacy, they often lose in user experience and the relevance of search results, through this lack of tailoring.
What Berlin-based Xayn has come up with is personalized, but a privacy-safe web search on smartphones, which replaces the cloud-based AI employed by Google et al. with the innate AI in-built into modern smartphones. The result is that no data about you is uploaded to Xayn’s servers.
And this approach is not just for “privacy freaks”. Businesses that need search but don’t need Google’s dominant market position are increasingly attracted by this model.
Xayn is privacy-safe, personalized mobile web search powered by on-device AIs
And the evidence comes today with the news that Xayn has now raised almost $12 million in Series A funding led by the Japanese investors Global Brain and KDDI (a Japanese telecommunications operator), with participation from previous backers, including the Earlybird VC in Berlin. Xayn’s total financing now comes to more than $23 million.
It would appear that Xayn’s fusion of a search engine, a discovery feed and a mobile browser has appealed to these Asian market players, particularly because Xayn can be built into OEM devices.
The result of the investment is that Xayn will now also focus on the Asian market, starting with Japan, as well as Europe.
Leif-Nissen Lundbæk, co-founder and CEO of Xayn said: “We proved with Xayn that you can have it all: great results through personalization, privacy by design through advanced technology and a convenient user experience through clean design.”
He added: “In an industry in which selling data and delivering ads en masse are the norm, we choose to lead with privacy instead and put user satisfaction front and center.”
The funding comes as legislation such as the EU’s GDPR or California’s CCPA have both raised public awareness about personal data online.
Since its launch, Xayn says its app has been downloaded around 215,000 times worldwide, and a web version of its app is expected soon.
Over a call, Lundbæk expanded on the KDDI aspect of the fund-raising: “The partnership with KDDI means we will give users access to Xayn for free, while the corporate — such as KDDI — is the actual customer but gives our search engine away for free.”
The core features of Xayn include personalized search results; a personalized feed of the entire internet, which learns from their Tinder-like swipes, without collecting or sharing personal data; and an ad-free experience.
Naoki Kamimeada, partner at Global Brain Corporation said: “The market for private online search is growing, but Xayn is head and shoulders above everyone else because of the way they’re re-thinking how finding information online should be.”
Kazuhiko Chuman, head of KDDI Open Innovation Fund, said: “This European discovery engine uniquely combines efficient AI with a privacy-protecting focus and a smooth user experience. At KDDI, we’re constantly on the lookout for companies that can shape the future with their expertise and technology. That’s why it was a perfect match for us.”
In addition to the three co-founders (Leif-Nissen Lundbæk, chief executive officer, Professor Michael Huth, chief research officer, and Felix Hahmann, chief operations officer), Dr Daniel von Heyl will come on board as chief financial officer. Frank Pepermans will take on the role of chief technology officer and Michael Briggs will join as chief growth officer.
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