In an era of AI, data is ever more valuable, especially structured data. CityFALCON captures financial content then leverages machine learning to structure it, generate analytics, extract insights, and deliver personalized data in 50+ languages. Users and clients use this structured data already, and the company is now looking to scale up their own proprietary AI products with that data, including dynamic sector classification and a more visual chatbot.

CityFALCON users and clients receive curated financial content feeds: news in 50+ languages, regulatory filings and investor relations documents (e.g., management letters, earnings calls, etc.), and associated analytics (sentiment, similarity, relevance scores) - all in one platform. 

The company plans to add price and fundamental data (including for private companies) in the near future, plus AI-powered sector classification and a chatbot to assist markets and investment research. 

Alternatives like traditional services tend to be expensive and inflexible or are narrowly focused, which leaves large and important audiences underserved. These audiences include wealth managers, professional and hobbyist investors, fintech companies, and knowledge management enterprises. Moreover, B2B2C clients, such as brokers, do not want pay for thousands of licenses for their users nor do they want to build the content-capturing and -processing technology themselves.

According to founder Ruzbeh Bacha, CityFALCON aims to be to financial data what Spotify is to music – a real-time engine for finding the most relevant financial content. 

B2C users can build watchlists, explore more than just news, and dive into sentiment and other analytics. Soon dynamic sectors, smart portfolios, private company insights, and a visual chatbot will also be available. B2B and B2B2C users can leverage this content for internal teams or redisplay to their own users. 

Base data is sourced from more than 13k pre-vetted publications, regulatory agencies, company websites, and APIs, while sentiment, relevance, and similarity are generated by CityFALCON's own models. Users and clients can select 300k topics from 27 topic and asset classes to start. Several filters enable refining the results for even better focus. Similar Stories Grouping and Key Headlines reduce reading and research time so users can get back to their lives.

Beyond the data, derived analytics, generated by in-house algorithms tweaked for business and finance, include sentiment, similarity, and relevance to guide and inform more efficient research:

Paywall-free content from 1000+ publications bring all the stories into one subscription and app:

Individual and aggregate Insider Transactions and (soon) Institutional Transactions are extracted automatically from filings:

New AI-driven products they are currently building include dynamic sector classification; smart portfolios; an interactive graphical chatbot; and private company insights. See examples below.

Notable clients include eToro, BNP Paribas, IEX Cloud, StoneX, Shares.io, Plum, Seedrs, and WiseAlpha, representing diverse industries from financial services to brokers and data providers. They also represent several countries, including the UK, US, France, Germany, Israel, and Italy. Through B2B2C and B2B clients, the company estimates about 300k end users of their products and services.

Beyond the features and data already available, the company's new dynamic sector classification system delivers Company-Sector relevance scores and many-to-many sector mappings (to reflect the complexities of the real economy), including for private UK companies. 

This is how they classify Apple in this new sector system:

Their chatbot answers questions about investing and markets to assist with research that is supplemented by data and visuals:

Coming soon are UK private company insights (US on the roadmap): 

CityFALCON is focused on 2 key streams of revenue:

1. API licensing fees - Monthly recurring fee or revenue share for licensing their curated content and tech. eToro, BNP Paribas, Seedrs, StoneX, Shares.io, Plum, and several others already use the API. Plans: https://www.bit.ly/32EUcDS

2. Premium Subscriptions - low-cost plans that offer select non-public and paywall-free content from 1000+ publications (https://bit.ly/3gYPqaC) and most content in the API but in graphical format for web and mobile users, plus personalisable push notifications. Plans: https://www.bit.ly/2RE3JV2

Their API appears within the top results on Google in major markets, including in the US, UK, Canada, Australia, Germany, France and Japan for the B2B keywords 'financial news API', generating warm leads. Linkbacks (mandated in contracts) bolster SEO even more.

They expect AI-powered products will soon drive revenue for both streams: dynamic sectors, smart portfolios, insights extraction, and an interactive graphical chatbot will further drive revenue.

CityFALCON estimates its market size is £22 billion with automation, long-tail coverage, and unrestricted access to their data data via API and web.

Target audiences are brokers, banks, investors, traders, and professionals in knowledge management (e.g., consultants).

Incumbent competitors are traditional providers that charge upwards of $20k/month for a single terminal or free alternatives like Yahoo Finance, which tend to use older interfaces and lack breadth.

New competitors are fintechs that usually focus on a single area or asset class, making full-view understanding of the economy more difficult.

Tangential competitors are products like ChatGPT (bolstered with several plugins), which currently face issues with hallucinations and regulatory issues, particularly with copyright.

The company considers its products superiors to these three classes of competitors: 

The company's mission is to democratize access to financial content, for both the retail audience and the enterprise audience that wants more flexibility and affordability. 

While the company has been in the AI game via machine learing since its founding, they have renewed their focus on newer AI technologies this year to power dynamic sector classifcation, further insights extractions, and their chatbot.

They believe their technology and team's experiences will help them win the AI RACE:

They have received many awards and recognition - cityfalcon.com/press

In the community, they run 13 Value Investing Meetups to educate 8,100 members, which also acts as a channel for feedback: bit.ly/33x2PPW

Raised c. £5m till date from eToro, Terrance Butler Holdings, serial entrepreneurs and equity crowdfunding. Over 3k investors under the Seedrs Nominee structure.

CityFALCON team remains focused on staying lean with an annual net burn of circa £930k in FY 2022-2023 (based on unaudited final accounts), even with a team of ~50 employees, data licensing costs and processing and storage costs of data. As at 13 September 2023, they have £463k in cash and liquid assets excluding investment money received in this round.

They plan to use the funds to retain talent and continue building  new AI-based products for sectors, extractions, smart portfolios, and chatbot. Marketing and advertising will also be funded.

They also commit the following to investors: Monthly updates; proper cash flow management; staying lean as they push towards breaking even and become self-sustainable; complete transparency.

The company was founded by - and is still run by - CEO Ruzbeh Bacha. He holds an MBA from Oxford and worked at KPMG, Nokia, Skype, and then Microsoft (after the acquisition). He has 30 years of investing experience in his own portfolio.

Other Key Management Personnel (KMPs) are 

• Law Zava - (CTO) - NATO cybersecurity, CTO at mobility company
• Cory Sarver (COO) - operations at BNY Mellon, ESL teacher in Asia
• Igor Mishkovski (Chief Data Scientist) - PhD in network theory, teaches data science

All KMPs are full-time on the CityFALCON project.

Advisors and investors include former Skypers, an angel investor who exited his last company at £500m, and several London people involved in finance in London and globally.

The company is rolling its experience with old-school AI tech into the new AI era to improve access to financial content for everyone. They already have several notable clients and practice lean cash management. They're seeking funding this round to build their new AI products faster and scale up their outbound efforts. 

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