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Caius is the new startup selected by the incubator of the European Space Agency in Greece (ESA BIC Greece). The operation of ESA BIC Greece is the result of the planning of the Ministry of Digital Governance and the European Space Agency or the active participation of Greece in the European Space Strategy. Corallia, the Unit of the "Athena" Research Center is responsible for the operation of ESA BIC Greece and in this context works closely with ESA to support 25 Greek startups exploiting Space technologies or providing services in this sector.
 

Caius is an artificial intelligence and big data processing startup that has set as its main goal the utilization of satellite and geomorphological data in the study of forest areas and natural systems. In this direction, it has developed the multi-award winning AILApaths with which it detects paths in nature.

“A huge percentage of forest trails remain unexploited, as we do not know their existence or their condition. With the help of artificial intelligence, the digitization of paths and by extension forest areas is now possible", say the professor of the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens Stathis Efstathopoulos and Giorgos Mendrinos (CEO), co-founders of Caius.

CAIUS uses a seven-layer automatic path detection architecture, consisting of several neural networks that analyze all available information about a path and present interested parties with digital maps with all the paths of a given area evaluated and continuously updated.

"The evolution of artificial intelligence, especially in the field of computer vision, combined with the improvement of the quality of stereoscopic images and multispectral images, now allows us to create systems that have as their central axis deep learning (deep learning) such as AILApaths and aim at the automated digital mapping and supervision of even the most demanding forest areas", says Giorgos Michas, CTO of Caius.

For access to the data as well as the necessary computing power for their utilization, the help of the ESA BIC Greece incubator will be valuable. The aim is to make AILApaths the first mass-use B2B and B2G tool for detecting, updating and evaluating paths, which will also bring a large number of forest areas into the digital age, thus paving the way for other innovative applications for organization, surveillance and sustainable use.

The next deadline for starting the evaluation of applications in the Permanent Open Call of ESA BIC Greece is February 13, 2023. Applications can be submitted by legal entities based in Greece (not older than 5 years), and by natural persons, who reside with a permit of work in Greece with the obligation to establish a legal entity in the Greek territory.