What exactly is FiveSquare about and what makes your company special?
Hans-Peter Pichler and Patrick Haidinger: Our team consists of data scientists, mathematicians, statisticians, and computer scientists who are very passionate about bringing the latest research findings in computer science and AI (Artificial Intelligence) directly to the business community. In other words, we want to help make companies more successful. AI technology can, in particular, contribute significantly by using existing data to enable more highly efficient processes and new business models.

When - and in what context - did you first think about creating your own company? How exactly did it come about?
Hans-Peter Pichler and Patrick Haidinger: We’ve known each other since our days at an HTL school, so we go back a ways. After school, we both went on to study at the JKU; I (Hans-Peter) majored in Business Informatics and Patrick majored in Computer Science and AI. Since then, we’ve had a mutual desire to put our heads together and apply our educational and academic backgrounds together with our areas of expertise and make a difference; this ultimately led to creating a company together. We wanted to create a company that is not only successful business-wise, but one that can develop solutions in an effort to advance humanity. This is how FiveSquare came about. Our mission is to bring our expertise and skills from academia to the people, so to say, directly where it can be applied and give mankind an opportunity to actively take part in the latest advances and technologies. At the moment, we are adding more people to our team and growing exponentially.

Is there an area you would like to focus on in particular?
Hans-Peter Pichler and Patrick Haidinger: The project application areas are becoming increasingly broader. European industrial and manufacturing companies not only benefit from the countless advantages of artificial intelligence; more than anything, AI can improve people's lives and make various areas of life easier and better. We believe this kind of diversification is extremely exciting. While we naturally aim to apply our expertise and recent technologies to make companies more efficient and drive them forward, people will continue to always at the center of what we do. In this regard, our primary goal is to make things a bit easier for people and provide support, true to the motto "by people for people".

What exactly can AI do here?
Hans-Peter Pichler and Patrick Haidinger: The health sector can, for example, benefit greatly from AI. Artificial Intelligence can, for example, use sensor networks and intelligent algorithms to detect and predict epileptic seizures, not only providing patients with more assurance on a daily basis, but also by improving treatment. In this area, we are working on the EPILEPSIA project together with the Institute for Information Systems - Software Engineering as well as with the Institute for Machine Learning at the JKU Linz.

You recently moved into the LIT Open Innovation Center – why have you decided to work there?
Hans-Peter Pichler and Patrick Haidinger: Working in an innovative, modern work environment was important to us. The LIT Open Innovation Center is exactly what we were looking for in Linz. We not only share the space with many other start-up and future-oriented companies, we also share thoughts and ideas. Naturally we also truly appreciate the close proximity to the university and our research partners. This kind of close proximity enables us to implement the most recent research findings quickly and efficiently for our customers.