History of Artificial Intelligence Acquisition
The competition for artificial intelligence startups is a relatively new social phenomenon. In 2016, the acquisition of artificial Intelligent Company showed a significant upward trend, which has continued to the present.

However, many artificial intelligence transactions took place as early as 2016. As early as the 80s and 90s of the last century, technology giants shut down the earliest trading of cognitive technology, when Apple bought the developers of coral and Lisp programming languages. At the same time, Microsoft also acquired the knowledge industry. It is estimated that more than 250 private artificial Intelligent Company have been purchased since 2012, but our research shows that there were 50 artificial Intelligent Company acquisitions before then.

Despite the merger and acquisition of artificial intelligence and the recent takeover spree, we do not understand the valuation and Acquisition Motives of artificial intelligence startups. Of the 340 startups that were found in our research, only 112 had reliable exit estimates. The motives behind the deal are not fully disclosed. For example, Apple Corp will not discuss the purpose or plan of acquiring a start-up company.
Analyze available data
However, the 50 noteworthy AI Trading (valued at $50 million or more) analysis might be useful, because it helps to promote, to help entrepreneurs find a market position in an already crowded ecosystem. Such analysis can also help venture companies and acquirers to develop a possible exit strategy. Entrepreneurs can dig deeper, explore the logic behind mergers and acquisitions, and find the most appropriate combination of their personal situations.

Exploring these transactions will help define at least three ways of acquiring artificial intelligence startups:
1, portfolio expansion: This is the most common reason for acquiring an artificial intelligence start-up company. Acquirers usually use the following two ways to complement each other to complete this kind of acquisition.  The first one is across the value chain. For example, when a company provides tools to deal with cyber threats, it will get a threat detection expert. Buyers looking for complementary, another way may be horizontal expansion. Natural Language Processing, for example, bought an artificial intelligence startup company that was especially good at dealing with some language.
There are various forms of acquisitions that help buyers expand their portfolios. In our research, some companies have acquired artificial intelligence startups in the neighborhood to make their existing products more comprehensive. Other companies tend to add new industries or specific market capabilities to their portfolios.
In the field of science and technology, several well-known computer hardware acquisition cases, for enterprises to provide a good example of portfolio expansion. For example, Intel has acquired Mobileye's computer vision technology as a complement to its high-performance computing and assets. ARM bought Apical, and the latter developed a technology for computer vision on low-power devices.
Software companies are also expanding product portfolios vertically. For example, Splunk's threat response technology combines with Capsida's detection capabilities, and Predix expands its platform by increasing real-time data integration. By acquiring OpenSpan, Pegasystems can increase the automation function of the robot on the basis of mastering the CRM system.
These examples show that, in order to find complementarities with potential buyers, entrepreneurs can choose to find in the technology / product queue.
Another way to find potential complementary companies is to achieve the goal by looking at several potential buyers in the industry, function, and market. For example, Nuance has acquired SpeechMagic to improve its position in the field of healthcare and speech recognition. Through the acquisition of Guavus, Thales Co has made great progress in predictive maintenance. And Pitchbook's ability to mine data from Private Companies is a powerful supplement to the Morningstar agency, a Morning Star Inc that specializes in stock analysis.
Horizontal exposure can facilitate the improvement of existing products, but a more common approach is to see it as a way to enter new markets.
When a company purchases a start-up company to expand its portfolio, whether it is vertical or horizontal, it must not only consider the target technology, but also consider the direction of its business development. In business, most of the artificial Intelligent Company bought under the expansion paradigm have been successful. Mobileye has created hundreds of millions of dollars in revenue, OpenSpan runs on 200 thousand computers, and PitchBook is expected to earn millions of dollars in profits when buying morningstar.
Portfolio expansion trading is the latest development of start-ups' survival. It will take years to build a company, and it will enter this stage when it is expected to become a joint stock company.
2, product improvement: this reason is also common in buyers. If a diversified company bought a professional company that had an advantage over existing products, then there would be an example of an improved product acquisition.
Supply chain integration or transformational Trading: these transactions are the least common. These transactions only happen when the industry changes, and usually involves a buyer who tries to buy the participants in the supply chain to preserve the correlation between their assets and their business.
When a large, typical diversified company purchases a professional company and integrates new technology into its own product, it will implement the acquisition of improved products. In this case, no company will actively pursue emerging markets. For example, LinkedIn bought Bright.com and matched its algorithm