Transforming the fashion industry by using AI, Omnious – a Korean fashion image recognition startup recently revealed that it has received a total of 1 billion won (about US$885K) in investments from Korea Investment Partners on January 9th.

This investment comes in as a Series A funding. As last year, Omnious has received a 300 million won (about US$265K) in seed investment from Mashup Angels and Big Basin Capital.

Jeong Hwa-Mok, the Head of Korea Investment Partners which led this fundraising round said, “Omnious has the highest level of technical expertise in the Deep-learning based image recognition field and a good teamwork. We expect the company to further develop its value chain in the industry after this investment.”

But apart from machine learning which is gradually expanding into more industries, Omnious is also leveraging on two other trends which include the rise of mobile commerce and the influence of social media on fashion and culture.

Riding on these waves, the startup has developed a fashion tech app that lets users shop an outfit by simply uploading an image from a social media post, newsfeed or photos they have taken on their phone.

Their proprietary algorithm then uses visual search and image recognition technology to analyse various fashion attributes ranging from images to items, colors, forms, shapes, details, prints, and materials etc., to search for similarities between different product images and return the precise match or similar options based on the user’s catalog.

At present, Omnious’s database has accumulated more than 2.8 million fashion images. In which it plans to use 800,000 fashion images as training datasets to develop an image recognition solution that automatically tags and classifies fashion images. Ultimately, it aims to create an image search engine that enables users to find similar product information quickly and accurately.

“As consumers needs are increasingly personalized, we will provide better customer experience and customized solutions through establishing strong connections with fashion and commerce companies that are interested in using the AI technology,” said Omnious CEO Jeon Jae-Young.

Omnious also aims to become a global image recognition AI solution company, to bring the benefits of image recognition, or computer vision not only into the world of fashion, but various industries. Additionally, the company said that it plans to flip the commercialization switch for their service later this year.

By Vivian Foo, Unicorn Media

Korea’s mattress manufacturer Ronas made an announcement on Tuesday that it has secured an undisclosed seed investment round from Big Basin Capital and Mashup Angels, according to local media reports.

The startup is known for its operations in Cork Bear. In which it is one of the new rafts of mattress makers that are benefitting from the compression technology which allows them to ship mattresses in a box.

The fact is, this bed-in-a-box proposition has been trending since 2015 led by a ballooning number of vendors including U.S-based Casper and other dot-com startups which introduced beds that are ship compressed, folded and rolled – changing the entire mattress-buying business model which was previously tedious and outdated.

In South Korea, Ronas has followed suit – introducing the box-bed presence to the local market through its Cork Bear delivery service which is designed to serve consumers a new option for a straight-to-go product. Where they can purchase mattresses that can be delivered – or taken home – in the size of a golf bag.

This compression packaging system has also allowed the company to conform to standards set by parcel carriers, and thus deliver their mattresses to the customer at little cost, as well as reaching locations that were once considered unreachable such as Jeju Island or other rural areas.

All Cork Bear manufacturing plants are located in Korea and consist of on-site mattress experts supervising the process. Additionally, the mattresses are packaged in an antibacterial fashion, which guarantees sanitary products. Even with such quality assurance, the prices are kept at 1/3 of the conventional mattress retailers as the mattresses are sold directly from the factories.

The CEO of Ronas commented, “This seed round will help reconstruct the manufacturing and operational system and allow Ronas to produce customized mattresses for each individual. We look forward to providing consumers with a good sleep by expanding the business into bed frames and other bed-related products.”

Also speaking on the investment, an investor from MashUp Angel said, “The Korean mattress market grew by an average of 9% annually, from US$500 million in 2005 to US$1.2 billion in 2015. Cork Bear will be the leader in the industry through its unprecedented strategy which makes high-quality mattresses affordable to everyone.”

By Vivian Foo, Unicorn Media

Triple W, a Tokyo-based startup developing a wearable device designed for those who worries about unpredictable bowel movements, announced last Tuesday that it was handpicked by NEDO to participate in their Corporate Alliance Programme.

This is the second time NEDO has provided such support to Triple W as previously in February 2016, the startup has acquired a subsidy from NEDO’s other R&D venture support project, the STS grant project.

The startup will be receiving a similar amount of up to 70 million yen (about US$610K) this time around in which they plan to use for joint research with major companies to miniaturize and optimize the performance of their technology known as DFree.

Worn on the stomach, the DFree device predicts the timing of bowel movements by using an ultrasonic sensor to scan activity in the bowels. Data is sent via Bluetooth to the mobile phone app, which then notifies the users before they even get an urge to use the bathroom.

The clinical research of the app will involve five major companies including Accenture, Itochu Chemical Frontier, Itochu Techno Solutions, Paramount Head, and Revamp. The contents of collaborative research with each of the companies are as follows:

1. Accenture: To collaboratively research on nursing care packages, combining various sensors and nursing care record data, joint development of algorithms and software, support for Euro-centric overseas development, etc.

2. Itochu Chemical Frontier: To develop a high precision ultrasonic sensor, high accuracy paired with algorithm development, etc.

3. Itochu Techno Solution: To conduct feasibility studies, joint development of a software, etc.

4. Paramount Head: To improve accuracy through the combination of various sensors, joint solution development, etc.

5. Revamp: To conduct a feasibility study at nursing care facilities, sales support, etc.

Among these companies, Revamp is a participant of the Series A funding round by Triple W conducted last July.

Speaking on the direction of DFree, Triple W’s CEO Atsushi Nakanishi said: “We’ve first begun introducing our technology in European countries since the structure of nursing care there has already been well-established.”

DFree is currently being used in French nursing homes as well as in Kawasaki City, where it has gained the Kawasaki Innovation Standard certification with the city subsidizing expenses for its use in nursing care facilities.

“Regarding areas where nursing care is not easy, I’d like to consider making rehabilitation models and home care support tools and packages, partnering with insurance companies,” Nakanishi further adds.

But for now, the startup will continue to promote trials for a full-scale introduction in addition to closing a contract with a German company.

On March 3rd, the startup had won the Grand Prize at the “Japan Healthcare Business Contest” – a contest launched by the Ministry of Economy, Trade, and Industry to support companies and individuals making bold efforts to create new businesses in the healthcare industry.

Additionally, the startup has also piqued global interest. As in Europe, DFree was exhibited as a use case of Soracom, an IoT-focused mobile network service from Japan, which announced its advance into Europe at the Mobile World Congress held in Barcelona earlier this month.

Besides that, DFree has also been scheduled to represent Japan in the Netherlands’ startup conference competition ‘Get in the Ring’ from May 17th to 19th.

By Vivian Foo, Next Unicorn