EquiLibre raised a Series A round at a €438 mn valuation, a steep increase over its earlier funding rounds. The Prague-based start-up previously secured a $10 mn seed round led by Blossom Capital at a €122.8 mn valuation, after a pre-seed investment from Credo Ventures, an early investor in ElevenLabs and UiPath.
The company will direct most of the new capital towards computing infrastructure. EquiLibre plans to build one of Central and Eastern Europe’s largest AI compute clusters, supporting the training of more advanced trading models.
Martin Schmid, Rudolf Kadlec and Matej Moravčík founded EquiLibre in late 2021. Schmid serves as CEO, Kadlec as CTO and Moravčík as CSO.
The founders previously worked together at DeepMind’s research office in Edmonton. Their work there produced DeepStack, the first AI system to beat professional players in no-limit Texas Hold’em poker.
After returning to Czechia, the founders recruited engineers from Google and other US technology companies. EquiLibre now employs about 25 people, and reinforcement learning pioneer Rich Sutton, a Turing Award winner, advises the company.
EquiLibre develops AI trading agents built on reinforcement learning. The models learn through trial and error rather than labelled datasets, then train on historical and live market data before executing trades autonomously.
The agents also adjust to changing market conditions. According to Beinsure, the company first tested its technology in cryptocurrency markets before moving into US equities.
EquiLibre now trades billions of dollars each day across the S&P 500 and Nasdaq through its partnership with quantitative trading firm Tower Research Capital. The company says its system has recorded no losing months since launch, though it has not released performance data or methodology supporting the claim.
Schmid said market feedback updates every millisecond, making reinforcement learning a suitable approach for financial trading. He said the company had tested the technology in the world’s largest and most liquid markets.
For Creandum, the lead investor, the round represents its largest investment so far. Partner Carl Fritjofsson Sellers said the team had proven its technology in one of the hardest operating environments and now has room to scale.
The funding joins a series of sizeable Czech start-up rounds and puts more focus on the country’s position within Central and Eastern Europe’s start-up market.
According to Beinsure, investors across Europe have increased their interest in AI companies serving financial infrastructure and capital markets.
EquiLibre’s deal follows recent funding rounds for financial technology companies including 9fin, Upvest and Midas.
