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prg.ai newsletter #55

The fourth edition of AI Days, the largest Czech festival dedicated to artificial intelligence, is in full swing — this year reaching 36 cities across the country. The European Commission has announced the creation of the Czech AI Factory with a new supercomputer named KarolAIna, CTU has elected AI expert Michal Pěchouček as its next rector, and Europe has unveiled new strategies to boost AI development. Meanwhile, the Czech AI scene keeps thriving — from a billion-crown investment in Resistant AI to new research labs and award-winning scientists.

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🔥 AI at the Center of Things

Dny AI is in full swing

On Monday, the 4th edition of the Czech Republic’s largest artificial intelligence festival Dny AI kicked off. We launched this nationwide showcase of AI in all its forms, uses, and shades simultaneously at the two largest planetariums in the country — in Prague and Brno. It crowned months of preparation that turned a vision of presenting the best of Czech AI into a festival full of inspiration, workshops, and meetings. This year’s program is nearing its finale, yet dozens of events are still ahead. Dny AI runs across 36 Czech cities through 16 November.

Czechia will have its own factory for AI development

The European Commission announced a major expansion of AI infrastructure — and this time the Czech Republic is among the beneficiaries. One of six new AI factories will be built here. At the heart of the Czech AI Factory (CZAI) will be a new KarolAIna supercomputer with 340 state-of-the-art AI chips and performance up to 850 PFlop/s. The factory will serve SMEs as well as the public and research sectors. The project, worth roughly one billion CZK, will be co-funded equally by the state and the European Union. The project involves the Czech Institute of Informatics, Robotics and Cybernetics (CIIRC CTU) to a significant extent.

Michal Pěchouček is the new Rector of CTU

The helm of the country’s leading technical university has been taken over by Michal Pěchouček — AI expert, Director of the Center for Artificial Intelligence at the Faculty of Information Technology, and one of the visionaries behind prg.ai. He plans major leadership changes at the university. Beyond creating a Vice-Rector for Human Resources, he aims to digitize administrative work, expand the use of AI, and accelerate collaboration with industry. He will assume office on 1 February 2026 — we wish him every success!

Looking back at RecSys

This year’s edition of the world’s premier conference on recommender systems (RECommender SYStems) brought over 1,000 participants to Prague from academia and industry. Topics ranged from current trends in personalization and recommendations in the AI era to ethics. Talks were led by experts working on recommender systems at the world’s largest companies — from Google and Booking.com to Netflix and Spotify. The conference’s prestige — rated A — was underscored by an acceptance rate of just 19%. The atmosphere and feedback confirmed Prague’s status as a rising hub of the global AI community.

Europe has a strategy for using artificial intelligence

The European Commission introduced two key documents — the Apply AI Strategy and AI in Science Strategy. Their goal is to support European companies in developing AI systems, speed up integration across strategic sectors, and ensure Europe is not just a consumer of innovation. As our director Lukáš Kačena wrote: “They won’t change the world on their own, but they mark an important shift in thinking. In the meantime, don’t rely on Brussels — build the AI future yourselves.”

EU legislation is set to slim down

Brussels hosted another meeting of the AI Board — the EU’s top coordination body for AI. The Czech Republic was represented, among others, by Deputy Minister of Industry and Trade Jan Kavalírek, who again presented the Czech position paper proposing concrete legislative simplifications. On 19 November, the European Digital Omnibus proposal will be published, aiming to reduce selected administrative burdens, for example around cookies.

🏡 What’s new at prg.ai

AI DAYS 2025: Prague hosted AI leaders

On Tuesday, 4 November, Prague hosted the ninth edition of NVIDIA AI DAYS 2025, organized by M Computers in cooperation with NVIDIA. Held as part of Dny AI, the event drew over 160 participants and received exceptional feedback. Speakers included Carlo Ruiz, Head of Enterprise Solutions & Operations at NVIDIA, prg.ai’s Lukáš Kačena, and the Czech Government’s AI Commissioner Jan Kavalírek. The program offered behind-the-scenes looks at the NVIDIA AI Factory and inspiring case studies from Czech companies.

AI Hotspot 2025: How can Europe win?

At Prague’s DOX+, the AI Hotspot conference delivered several sharp perspectives on the future — or rather the present — of AI. A panel featuring prg.ai director Lukáš Kačena tackled a tough question: how to accelerate Europe’s AI transformation with the AI Act in the background and the US in the lead. If you missed it, the organizer and prg.ai member Profinit recently published a short video recap.

Regions 4.0 showcased successful AI in practice

A week later, Lukáš Kačena took on moderating duties. He guided 500 participants of the Regions 4.0 webinar by the Center for Regional Development through current trends in AI for public administration and Czech real-world deployments. Highlights included ANAKONDA — the first Czech AI tool for grant control — and DORA, an AI assistant for internal regulations. More success stories followed at the Modern Public Administration 2025 conference in Olomouc, where prg.ai was also represented.

Welcome to Planet AI

Two dozen speakers, a sold-out planetarium, and AI changing the rules of the game — that sums up the Planet AI conference by Hospodářské noviny. Rossum AI co-founder Petr Baudiš addressed AI reliability, PwC’s Patrik Meliš-Čuga unpacked the AI Act, and newly elected CTU Rector Michal Pěchouček highlighted how fast AI is reshaping the labor market. Demos of AI in practice also made a splash — for instance, SpaceKnow’s ability to parse thousands of satellite images into economic insights. Our director Lukáš Kačena added a confident line: Czechia is no AI colony.

Miton released a ranking of the most promising startups

There’s no doubt Czechia and Slovakia have spawned a wave of standout startups. Miton AI has now published its own ranking of 100 most promising projects founded after 2020 with at least one CZ/SK founder. With input from prg.ai experts and the Czech AI map, they distilled a crème-de-la-crème selection.

Taiwanese companies are excited about Czech AI

As part of Czech Space Week, a large delegation from Taiwan — including representatives of ASUS, Globaltek, Glintmed, and i2i — visited Czechia. They all came with one goal: to build ties with the Czech AI scene. At prg.ai they were welcomed by Lenka Kučerová, who introduced the newly launched Czech AI map and, in an interactive format, connected them with potential vendors and leading Czech researchers. Judging by the enthusiasm, this won’t be their last visit.

Czech AI reports dozens more submissions

Just over a month ago we launched Czech AI — the first comprehensive overview of the domestic AI scene. Since then, dozens more entities have applied to join the nearly five hundred already listed. The continued interest shows the Czech AI ecosystem is very much alive.

P.S.: Know a company, research group, or non-profit that should be on the map? Send them to the new CNAIP website, where a simple form awaits.

👏 Local AI Achievements

The Algorithms Laboratory will study how to speed up IT technologies

In October, CTU’s Faculty of Information Technology opened its twenty-first lab. The Algorithms Laboratory focuses on string and tree processing problems, social choice, computational geometry, and game mechanisms. “An efficient algorithm does things not only correctly, but fast and with minimal computational resources. Without them, we couldn’t use technology at today’s scale — from web search and navigation to artificial intelligence,” says lab head Michal Opler, Ph.D.

The Milada Paulová Award goes to Prof. Olga Štěpánková

Prof. Olga Štěpánková of CTU’s Czech Institute of Informatics, Robotics and Cybernetics is the latest recipient of the Milada Paulová Award. The prize is awarded annually to female scientists for their research, each year from a different field. This year, the Ministry of Education, Youth and Sports and the NKC — Gender and Science at the Czech Academy of Sciences recognized Prof. Štěpánková’s lifelong contributions to AI.

A new game accelerator gives students a chance

The Prague Innovation Institute and the City of Prague launched the first Prague Game Accelerator — an intensive three-month program supporting young game developers. CTU’s Faculty of Electrical Engineering scored big, with its students making up five of the ten teams selected by the jury. Teams receive mentoring, funding, and access to a network of experts. The program concludes with a demo day planned for November.

CLARA Days will bring leading brain & AI researchers to Prague

Marking its first year, the CLARA Center is organizing CLARA Days 2025 — a two-day international meeting of scientists, industry experts, students, and policymakers focused on connecting insights about the brain with opportunities in AI. The event takes place 11–12 November 2025 in Prague-Dejvice, co-organized by INDRC and CIIRC CTU. The main theme: breakthroughs in interdisciplinary brain research, especially related to Alzheimer’s disease.

FIT CTU now led by Jan Janoušek

Assoc. Prof. Jan Janoušek, Ph.D., longtime head of the Department of Theoretical Computer Science, has become Dean of CTU’s Faculty of Information Technology. “I want FIT CTU to be a faculty that doesn’t fear new challenges, is open to collaboration and innovation, and maintains high standards: excellent teaching, internationally respected research, and strong industry ties. An open, friendly atmosphere is essential,” says the new Dean, who will lead the faculty through 2029.

Students will try to beat a virtual bookmaker

The Qminers Quant Hackathon returns for its fourth year, connecting data, algorithms, and technology with real-world challenges. Instead of financial markets, participants will work with sports results. The goal remains: design a winning machine-learning investment strategy and beat a virtual bookmaker. The winner — announced on 6 December — takes home 60,000 CZK.

Spring School of AI seeks participants

Planning your spring? Charles University’s Faculty of Mathematics and Physics invites students to the Spring School of Artificial Intelligence. This week-long course in the Krkonoše Mountains connects students across AI fields, fosters collaboration, and inspires research and potential Ph.D. study. A central workshop has each student present their research or a selected paper. Participation is free and open beyond Charles University.

CTU FEE student’s thesis makes the IT SPY 2025 finals

Aneta Furmanová, a master’s graduate of CTU’s Faculty of Electrical Engineering, advanced to the top eight in the prestigious IT SPY 2025 competition recognizing the best IT theses in Czechia and Slovakia. Her thesis modeled the structure of sonic crystals using machine learning with emphasis on physical interpretability. You can vote for Aneta until 17 November on the competition’s website.

FIS VŠE team can predict a paper’s impact before publication

Researchers and students from our new member, the Faculty of Informatics and Statistics at the University of Economics, Prague (FIS VŠE), led by Prof. Tomáš Kliegr, developed tools combining large language models and symbolic AI to predict the impact of scientific papers and suggest improvements. Two papers describing the experiments will appear in November/December 2025 in the prestigious journal Machine Learning.

Metamorphoses of Art 2.0 on the edge of AI and classical art

The multimedia exhibition Metamorphoses of Art 2.0 explores how the dialogue between inner inspiration and AI can guide artists. Hosted in the atrium of CTU’s Czech Institute of Informatics, Robotics and Cybernetics from 13 November 2025 to 4 January 2026, it builds on a successful 2024 project featuring painter Klára Sedlo in dialogue with AI. This year, more AI models, broader interpretations, and — new — young artists from the Vladislav Vančura Art School join the concept.

November talks at Matfyz focus on AI

Charles University’s Faculty of Mathematics and Physics has a strong November lineup. On Thursday 13 November, two events run in parallel — Quantum physics in AI images and sounds and AI in creative writing (“Fake it till you make it”). On 26 November, Stanislav Fort focuses on Adversarial attacks on neural networks, followed on 27 November by a talk at the intersection of AI and law.

University, trial run

Early October saw the start of the 11th Juniors’ University of Charles University (JUK). Participants get a first-hand taste of what studying at Matfyz is like: lectures by experts on current topics, discussions, and plenty of Q&A. Beyond theory, instructors present practical demonstrations and applications used in modern technologies — from data work and cryptocurrencies to AI.

“From zero to hero” course teaches students to defend against cyber threats

The online course Introduction to Security by the Stratosphere Laboratory at CTU FEE’s Center for Artificial Intelligence attracted 1,200 participants this year. Over 14 weeks they learn about penetration testing, web attack mechanisms, defense strategies against online threats, and the role of AI in these areas. “We have 96 on-site students from CTU, plus lifelong-learning students, Erasmus visitors, and students of the new prg.ai Master program,” note Ing. Valeros and Dr. García, who helped design the course.

Companies

Resistant AI raised another CZK 600 million

An estimated valuation around CZK 5 billion, solid profitability, and another successful CZK 600 million round. Resistant AI, led by Martin Rehák, keeps accelerating. The company helps clients worldwide (e.g., ČSOB and AXA) detect fraud attempts using forged documents — proof that billion-koruna ideas can grow in Czechia.

European success for Czech RoboTwin

Following a recent pre-seed investment, startup RoboTwin scored another win. As the first Czech company in three years, it succeeded before the European Commission and secured support from the EIC Accelerator — Europe’s flagship deep-tech program. “Our vision is to become the global #1 in no-code industrial robotics. EIC picked us among excellent startups because they see the potential of our technology and, like us, believe we can deliver,” said CTO/co-founder and CTU alumna Megi Mejdrechová.

Expand the Apify Store and claim the prize

Within “The Apify $1M Challenge” the Prague startup will pay developers up to $1 million in total for building and publishing new Actors on the Apify Store — from data-for-AI tools and AI agents to automation utilities. Anyone can join, including vibecoders who leverage AI in their work. The deadline is 31 January 2026.

AI startup Aisle goes public

After a year of testing, it’s finally out. Aisle is an AI-native system that identifies and, in collaboration with humans, fixes vulnerabilities in software applications and IT systems — cutting remediation from weeks to minutes. Research at Aisle is led by co-founder and AI scientist Stanislav Fort.

Blindspot AI knew the election results before the statistics office

Seventy-eight. That’s how many minutes after polls closed Blindspot AI from Adastra needed to compute parliamentary election results. The model required only 12.27% of the total vote to reach the final distribution, with a maximum deviation of 0.54%.

Google unlocks Gemini for students — free for one year

CZK 0 for 1 year. That’s Google’s latest offer for students seeking access to Gemini. The promo, expiring 9 December, includes unlimited chats, image uploads, quiz generation with broader access to the 2.5 Pro model, Deep Research, audio overviews, and 2 TB of storage.

Datamole turns 10 and showcases innovation in agriculture

Datamole invites you to the public meetup “Data & AI Innovation in Agriculture & Industry,” spotlighting compelling case studies of AI and data innovation in agriculture and industry — from real projects to examples of research-practice transfer.

It takes place on 26 November 2025 at 18:30 at CTU FIT — and doubles as Datamole’s 10th anniversary. More on LinkedIn.

DataSentics lines up webinars and the Data + AI World Tour

DataSentics prepared two November webinars. The first, “Automating SAP BW Migrations: Lessons Learned”, runs on Wednesday 19 November. The second, a week later, focuses on AI-powered dynamic pricing. You can also meet the team in person — in Zurich or Paris during the Data + AI World Tour.

Virtual Eva and the Buddy AI tool: AI is on the rise at O2

How has gen-AI changed operator O2? In an interview for Hospodářské noviny, Petr Hirš, Head of Dataclair O2’s AI Center, said: “We process over one terabyte of compressed data daily — without AI it would be impossible.” Their virtual AI tool Buddy achieves over 90% answer accuracy and flags uncertainty in the rest. Progress at O2 will also be detailed in an interactive Dny AI session by Petr Netolický and Karolína Hejdánková, linking technical, methodological, and business aspects of big data and AI — with practical demos.

Missed the HPE Technology Tour 2025? No problem

Six cities, hundreds of participants, and practical answers to IT challenges in virtualization, security, AI, and infrastructure. That sums up this year’s record HPE Technology Tour. The themes will now be explored in depth in a series of online webinars. The first ran on Wednesday 5 November, with three more weekly installments to follow. Pick yours.

🎭 Events We’re Looking Forward To

🧩 Notable News & Resources

Prague Innovation Institute values Prague’s tech ecosystem at €19B

Since 2019, its value has grown eightfold, according to a report by the Prague Innovation Institute created with Dealroom. In the CEE region, Prague ranks third, after Tallinn and Kyiv. In the number of local unicorns, however, Prague lags behind other hubs.

90,000 Czech companies implemented AI last year

Czechia’s AI revolution is in full swing, according to the Unlocking The Czech Republic’s AI Potential 2025 study by Amazon Web Services. 29% of all companies now use AI regularly (up from 22% last year). Over 370,000 companies in Czechia use AI today, with 90,000 adopting it last year — roughly one business every six minutes. The findings premiered at AWS Cloud Day Prague 2025, which drew 2,000 cloud experts.

Meet Czechia’s Top Women in Science 2025

They teach computers to see and understand images better than humans, study how to stop cancer, and design faster computing to accelerate drug discovery — and more. Explore Forbes’ selection of top female scientists in Top Women in Science 2025.

Grab early-bird tickets for MLP 2026

Machine Learning Prague 2026 is six months away, but organizers are rewarding those who “Be Prepared.” The first hundred attendees can claim discounted early-bird tickets — up to €100 off. Confirmed speakers already include Weipeng Xu (Valka.AI, ex-Meta) and Ariane Mora (Caltech). As usual, prg.ai is a partner of the event.

Lorem Ipsum Academy shows how to turn research into business

Moving from researcher to deep-tech leadership isn’t trivial. Lorem Ipsum Academy offers courses and bootcamps to turn research outcomes into viable products and companies. Participants learn the basics of business, investment thinking, and team leadership — bridging academia and industry with hands-on experience from those who’ve gone from lab to startup.

📢 Community Calls

CZK 800 million available to support AI

We teased it last time — now it’s official. The state has allocated CZK 800 million for the second public competition in the TWIST program to support AI. It targets SMEs, with up to CZK 30 million per project. As Deputy Minister Jan Kavalírek wrote: “To put Czechia among technology leaders, we must actively support AI research, development, and innovation — not only in academia but also in industry. I’m glad we’re doing exactly that.”

💼 Open Positions

Apify

 

CIIRC

 

ČEPS

 

Datamole

 

DataSentics

 

Dataclair O2

 

DNAi

 

ententee

 

JetBrains

 

Make

 

MAMA AI

 

MSD

 

Profinit

 

PwC

 

Raiffeisenbank

 

Resistant AI

 

T-Mobile

 

MFF UK

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