German startup Aleph Alpha, identified in January as a StateUp 21 One to Watch, has raised a €23 million Series A round co-led by Earlybird VC, Lakestar, and UVC Partners. This brings the company’s total funding to €28.3 million.

Founded in 2019, Aleph Alpha develops artificial intelligence tools for use in security-critical environments.

Jonas Andrulis, CEO and founder of Aleph Alpha, said: “Aleph Alpha’s mission is to enable the accessibility, usability and integration of large, European multilanguage and multimodal AI models following the likes of GPT-3 and DALL-E, driving innovation for the explainability, alignment and integration.”

Andrulis explained that this funding will “significantly accelerate the process of bringing the latest generation of AI technology into application and secure the digital sovereignty for public and private sector partners in Europe and beyond.”

The startup has forged partnerships with academic organisations including the University of Duisburg-Essen and Technical University of Darmstadt, while also participating in open-source organisations such as Eleuther.ai, a grassroots collective of researchers working to increase accessibility to AI research.

Aleph Alpha highlights its commitment to “European values and ethical standards” and “supporting fairer access to modern AI research – aimed at counteracting ongoing ‘de-democratization’, monopolization, and loss of control or transparency.”