Introducing Probabl: The New AI Company Revolutionizing Data Science with scikit-learn

Probabl stands out in the AI landscape as a distinctive startup emerging from France. This innovative company is an Inria spin-off, built around scikit-learn, a widely acclaimed open-source data science library from the renowned French research institute Inria.

Scikit-learn boasts over 45,000 stars on GitHub and is a trusted Python module utilized by machine learning teams specializing in tabular data. It offers robust capabilities for model fitting, predictions, cross-validation, and more, making it a crucial tool for developers.

If you're not a machine learning developer, scikit-learn might be a new term for you. However, many prominent companies, including Spotify, Hugging Face, Booking.com, and Dataiku, leverage this library to enhance their products.

In response to the growing need for sustainable development and funding, some contributors behind scikit-learn, along with other Inria-backed open-source initiatives, have joined forces to create Probabl. Their goal is to ensure these valuable projects receive continued support and funding through revenue-generating ventures.

Notable researchers associated with this initiative include Camille Troillard, Gaël Varoquaux, Olivier Grisel, François Goupil, Guillaume Lemaitre, Jérémie Du Boisberranger, and Fabien Gandon. Leading the charge as CEO is Yann Lechelle, the former CEO of Scaleway, who dedicated four months as an Entrepreneur in Residence at Inria to focus on this venture.

“We are a software publisher,” Lechelle explains, “but our initial offerings will include professional services, training, and certification, particularly centered on scikit-learn. Our vision extends across the complete data lifecycle, encompassing organization, cleaning, machine learning, and MLOps.”

Probabl features a diverse shareholder structure:

- Public shareholders, including Inria's investment arm, Inria Participations, and the French government through its French Tech Souveraineté program.

- Private shareholders, such as Costanoa Ventures.

- Individual contributors.

All stakeholders will be involved in the governance of this newly established organization. Committed to its mission of industrial and digital sovereignty, Probabl aims to develop genuinely open-source projects, a commitment notably lacking in the current AI sector.