YOURIKA

YOURIKA is an AI venture platform that builds and scales companies serving specific industry verticals where accuracy, trust and measurable outcomes matter. Its model rests on three shared components: an "Intelligence Foundation" of common AI infrastructure, models and research; domain expertise covering industry-specific knowledge, workflows and data; and a venture creation function that builds and scales independent companies and products around validated market opportunities. Each venture operates with its own market and customer focus while drawing on the shared platform.

Current ventures disclosed on the company site address senior and long-term care workforce intelligence — helping providers identify, hire and retain caregivers most likely to succeed and stay, framed around protecting EBITDA, reducing turnover and improving care — and a nurse-first intelligence platform intended to help nurses learn, develop and make more informed career decisions. The company states it continues to work with industry experts to identify, validate and create additional verticalized ventures.

Earlier positioning of the company centred on education technology. Under the name YourIKA (short for Your Intelligent Knowledge Assistant), it combined artificial intelligence with instant messaging to deliver tutoring support to students, using machine learning, deep learning, neural networks and natural language processing. That work led to ORBITS, a Personalized Learning Experience Platform (PLXP) for teenage students that curates study materials, assesses understanding and connects students to resources in real time, and to smart'n, an AI-driven learning support platform for nurses preparing for professional licences and certifications. A separate advisory arm, yourikaLABS, offered AI consulting to enterprise partners.

Founding story

Rob Henderson, previously the founder of angel investing groups, a local Enactus chapter, and Yconic — described as Canada's largest platform for students pursuing higher education, with over one million annual student users — began researching how artificial intelligence could support learning after concluding that students lacked accessible learning support because there are not enough teachers, tutors and trainers to meet individual needs. In 2018 he recruited Dr. Fakhri Karray, a University of Waterloo electrical and computer engineering professor and head/co-director of the university's Artificial Intelligence Institute, as a founder and chief scientist, and Karray's former Ph.D. student Dr. Shady Shehata, a Waterloo Engineering alumnus and adjunct professor who had spent ten years at D2L, as CTO. The company was named YourIKA, short for Your Intelligent Knowledge Assistant, around the principle that anyone should be able to learn, understand and discover without limits.

Business model

YOURIKA operates as a venture platform: it partners with industry experts, practitioners, researchers and organizations to create AI ventures, then builds and scales them as independent companies and products on top of shared AI infrastructure, research and operational expertise. An earlier structure paired product businesses (smart'n for nurse learning, ORBITS for student learning) with yourikaLABS, an advisory practice serving selected enterprise partners.

Traction

The early tutoring product was tested at five Ontario university campuses (University of Waterloo, Wilfrid Laurier University, University of Guelph and two University of Toronto campuses) and partnered with online learning platforms including Maplesoft and Chegg. Selection for the Amazon Alexa accelerator involved being one of nine companies chosen from 1,200 applicants. The company graduated from the Accelerator Centre's Accelerator Program in fall 2021, and reported developing real-time knowledge-assessment technology cited as 7.2x more accurate than existing market alternatives.

Latest developments

The company's current site describes a multi-venture vertical AI platform with two named ventures — workforce intelligence for senior and long-term care, and a nurse-first intelligence platform — plus an ongoing process of partnering with industry experts to identify and validate additional verticalized ventures. Open roles listed include Engagement Manager for its AI Lab, full-stack developer and React Native developer.