Scyfer, a spinout from University of Amsterdam that is working on machine learning technology, has been acquired by Qualcomm for an undisclosed sum.

Scyfer, a Netherlands-based artificial intelligence (AI) technology developer spun out from University of Amsterdam, was acquired yesterday by semiconductor manufacturer Qualcomm for an undisclosed amount.

Max Welling, professor at Amsterdam and co-founder of Scyfer, and staff will remain with the spinout and continue to be based in Amsterdam. Welling is set to offer his expertise into AI research and development to Qualcomm.

Founded in 2013, Scyfer develops customised AI software aimed at industries such as manufacturing, where it enables inspection of equipment using computer vision, healthcare, where solutions include early-stage disease detection, and finance, where its offering includes revenue prediction.

The acquisition follows Qualcomm and University of Amsterdam forming a joint research laboratory in 2015 called Quva, which focuses on machine learning technology for mobile and computer vision.

Scyfer’s technology should support the corporate’s goal of developing AI technology that can run on an end-user’s device, such as a smartphone, rather than operating in the cloud.

Matt Grob, executive vice-president of technology at Qualcomm, said: “We started fundamental research a decade ago, and our current products now support many AI use cases from computer vision and natural language processing to malware detection on a variety of devices – such as smartphones and cars – and we are researching broader topics, such as AI for wireless connectivity, power management and photography.