A new Deeptech investment for INNOVACOM : HINFACT, artificial intelligence for pilot training
13 April 2023
press release
Paris, 12 April 2023 – Innovacom, a venture capital pioneer in France, is acquiring a stake in Hinfact via its Technocom3 fund. Specialising in psychological and behavioural data analysis, the company designs and supplies AI-based software solutions intended to enhance airline pilot training and flight safety.
This initial €4 million funding round, through which Innovacom is investing €1.5 million, aims to help the company accelerate its commercial development, expand internationally and extend its cutting-edge technology to applications in other business sectors.
Created in 2019 by Thomas Bessière and Thibault Vanderbrouck, both engineers and entrepreneurs boasting thorough insight into the challenges facing the aviation sector, Hinfact is a spin-off of the ISAE-SUPAERO Neuroscience and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory in Toulouse. This institution, a worldwide reference for behavioural research focussed on airline pilots, is regularly called upon by NASA, the NTSB, the French Bureau of Enquiry and Analysis for Civil Aviation Safety (BEA) and Air France regarding the full range of issues involving research into the strengths and weaknesses of the human brain in the cockpit.
Hinfact provides airlines, aircraft manufacturers and flight schools with artificial intelligence allowing for objective analysis of pilot skills and performance, while continuously recording all contextualised physiological and behavioural data generated in flight simulators. This software solution, the only one of its kind on the market, is suitable both for initial pilot training and regular procedural reviews, and serves to confirm that skills have been effectively acquired.
Hinfact thus guarantees significant improvement in the quality of pilot training and compliance with the regulations in force, all while increasing the time efficiency not only of training for each pilot, but also of initiatives to create, distribute, update and verify training programmes.
At present, this innovative technology is intended for the aeronautic sector. However, it could soon find relevant applications in other industries and markets that rely on complex systems, particularly in the fields of energy, robotics and surgery.
Hinfact is carrying out this fund-raising initiative following validation of its technology, and has begun to sign its first contracts, in particular with Dassault Aviation, several airlines, as well as the French civil engineering school ENAC. Innovacom’s equity investment is intended to help the company accelerate its industrial and commercial development, particularly beyond French borders, and extend its technology to other business sectors.
“We have built a far-ranging set of solutions that serve to provide better inclusion of and insight into pilots’ behaviour in the cockpit, while guaranteeing multi-level compliance thanks to the processing of massive volumes of data. Today, we are very pleased to open the capital to Innovacom, a specialist in disruptive technologies boasting extensive experience supporting entrepreneurs in their growth ambitions,”
said Thomas Bessière, CEO of Hinfact.
“Hinfact is exactly the type of company in which we like to invest: talented entrepreneurs who have brought together a remarkable team, advanced technology offering true added value to an existing market, and finally a market need characterised by commercial growth and initial contracts signed with top names in aviation, with more certain to come. The company will now be able to expand internationally, and subsequently apply its technology to other industrial sectors,”
explained Alban Nénert, Innovacom Associate.
about Hinfact
Hinfact has developed a technology to transpose, replicate and monetise any expertise in any application domain. Hinfact applies this technology in the aviation sector by integrating human factors and compliance expertise.
