History

In the late 1994 and early 1995, Morteza Kamali, a former physics student and the freshman computer science student at Iran University of Science and Technology, gave a series of talks at SEComp research lab (the artificial intelligence lab of the university) about some potential relations between physics and intelligence. These talks motivated a sophomore and researcher at the lab, Farnad Laleh, to join him to form a small research group under the supervision of lab director, Ahmad Reza Mirzai.

In March 1997, Ahmad R. Mirzai left the university and joined Westminster University in London and Farnad Laleh was graduated from IUST, and therefore the research group was almost revoked. But the research results generated by the group between 1995 and 1997 was so promising that Farnad decided to dedicate his future occupation to the expansion of these results. Therefore, Farnad Laleh formed Aria Technology Group in June 1997 as a partnership between Morteza Kamali and himself. At the beginning, Farnad had supposed that Ahmad R. Mirzai would join the partnership and take over its direction, but he could not actually join the group because of engaging in other jobs and Farnad took over its direction himself.

Between 1997 and 2000, the group was successful in research but failed in some efforts to commercialize the research results. This failure and Morteza Kamali's weak devotion to the group caused Farnad to fire him from the group in September 2000. At the same time, Farnad invited a business veteran, Mohammad Rezaei, to the group to take part with him in the commercialization process. To this end, Farnad defined three different offices at the group as its main body: Science & Tech, Coordination, and Global Affairs, the first twos under his direction, and the last one under the direction of Mohammad Rezaei. The new structured group was successful in both of research and finding its business paths, but due to the intervention of some international rivals, the revenue of the group was delayed. This delay caused Mohammad Rezai to leave the group in September 2002. As a result, the group was naturally converted into a sole partnership and Farnad took over all the managing directions.

In May 2007, Farnad restructured the group again to engage it more efficiently in industrial projects. To this end, two major steps were taken. Firstly, a significant transformation in the Commercialization Program was happened and the program was closely tied to the Appetizer and Research Kit programs and can now be supposed as their tail. It does not follow any more the idea of commercializing research results by forming spin-off companies. Secondly, the group was completely organized as a sole partnership and the previous structure of three different offices at the group was changed into a unique dynamic office. This would permit the director to use an ad hoc method in the management of the group to make it a very flexible and responsive business entity. Although the new restructuring made some changes in the group's business model, it did not affect the old policy of the group in doing some not-for-profit research activities in addition to its business activities. Therefore, the group still follows the policy of publishing various free materials.