Creoir, an Oulu-based DefenceTech company developing voice AI for defence and mission-critical systems, has raised a Seed investment from Gungnir Capital. The Swedish VC fund is leading Creoir’s ongoing Seed round that has a €2 million target.
The company plans to use this capital to accelerate the commercialisation of the EdgeVUI and Operator Assistant products and meet growing demand from European defence customers.
“Defence operators work under extreme pressure, and hands-free voice interaction returns critical attention to the mission. Across Europe, demand for voice AI in defence systems continues to grow as programs prioritise operator efficiency under operational stress. With Gungnir Capital behind us, we can accelerate deliveries to our defence customers and advance our solutions from validated pilot projects to fielded capability,” said Antti Lilja, CEO and co-founder of Creoir.
Founded in 2012 by Lilja, Jaakko Mattila, and Oskari Ketola, Creoir specialises in embedded speech technologies and AI solutions for the defence industry. The company states that it helps its partners future-proof command-and-control systems, reduce operator cognitive load, and enhance situational awareness through secure, on-device voice AI that works hands-free and offline, without cloud connectivity.
According to the company, operators of complex defence systems, from command and control and combat management to vehicles, sonar systems and radios, work under intense cognitive load where every second counts.
Creoir claims that EdgeVUI lets operators interact with the systems by voice, hands-free and in their native language. Operator Assistant, an AI-powered knowledge base product, enables instant access to mission-critical information.
EdgeVUI enables the development of defence-grade voice AI by providing Natural Language Understanding (NLU) tools utilising Automatic Speech Recognition (ASR), Text-to-Speech (TTS), and Speech Signal Enhancement (SSE) technologies from Cerence AI, a US-based developer and manufacturer of speech technologies used by leading automakers, two-wheeler OEMs, and trucking companies.
The company highlighted that the technologies run entirely on the device, work offline with no cloud dependency, and are built for noisy, security-critical environments where connected solutions are not an option.
“I have sat in a cockpit where cognitive overload is a bigger threat than most adversaries. Modern command systems drown the operator in information, and whoever can control their systems by voice, offline and in the noise of battle, wins tempo. Creoir solves a real operational problem with technology already in projects with Europe’s leading defence primes, and that is exactly the kind of company Gungnir Capital exists to back,” said Max Villman, Managing Partner, Gungnir Capital.
The company reported that it already works with several of Europe’s leading defence primes and system integrators, with ongoing projects at Saab, Leidos, and ThyssenKrupp Marine Systems (TKMS), among others.
Creoir recently announced its selection to participate in the NATO Innovation Range for the Layered Counter-UAS Initiative (LCI-X), a NATO-led operational experiment focused on layered counter-unmanned aerial system capabilities.
Source: EU-Startups
