Advanced Intelligent Systems

Advanced Intelligent Systems (AIS), established in October 2013, is a custom robotics engineering firm based in Burnaby, British Columbia. The company was founded by Farhang Bidram and Robert Vahedi with the objective of making robotic solutions accessible, particularly for unstructured industries like agriculture and healthcare that face challenges in adopting automation due to significant costs and risks. Farhang Bidram, who serves as CTO, brings over two decades of experience in robotics business development, including his prior role as founder and CEO of an industrial automation company. Robert Vahedi, the COO, has more than 20 years of international experience as a managing consultant engineer with various tech companies and financial institutions. In 2016, Afshin Doust, a seasoned entrepreneur with a background in finance, sales, and business consulting, joined as CEO to guide the company's growth.

AIS operates on a core strategy of reducing the cost, time, and risk associated with developing autonomous robotic solutions. This is achieved by utilizing a proprietary and deep library of customizable software and hardware modules that can be rapidly integrated to create a wide range of custom autonomous robots for industry-specific challenges. The company designs and creates both the hardware and software for its robots from scratch, aside from off-the-shelf components like processors and cameras, which gives them full ownership of their assets. This modular approach allows for easy upgrades, preventing equipment from becoming obsolete.

The company primarily serves business-to-business (B2B) clients in sectors requiring automation for dangerous, repetitive, or labor-intensive tasks. While its main focus is on creating custom solutions, AIS also offers its own products on a Robot-as-a-Service (RaaS) or Machine-as-a-Service basis. This business model allows clients to pay a licensing fee and then pay for the amount of work the robot performs, lowering the barrier to entry for new technology adoption. One of its flagship products is 'BigTop', an autonomous ground vehicle designed for the horticultural industry to automate the strenuous task of moving and spacing plant pots in nurseries and greenhouses. The company has also demonstrated its adaptability by pivoting its agricultural technology to create an autonomous UV disinfection robot in response to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Keywords: custom robotics, autonomous modular robots, agricultural robotics, horticultural automation, Robot-as-a-Service, RaaS, autonomous ground vehicles, industrial automation, machine-as-a-service, modular robotics, nursery automation, greenhouse robotics, disinfection robots, robotics engineering firm, autonomous solutions, custom automation, B2B robotics, Farhang Bidram, Afshin Doust, Robert Vahedi