Startup Circle: How Spyne turns e-commerce sites into a visual treat

Spyne was formed in 2018 to use deep tech to solve the challenge of content management and distribution for photographers. We bring the industry-first computer vision and AI-powered solution to the product cataloging space, allowing businesses and marketplaces to create studio-finish images at scale, 10x faster, and at a much lesser cost.

Our products are based on visual AI, which employs deep learning to comprehend visual intent more quickly than humans. For example- our all-in-one White label photo app + SDK solution allows businesses to take use of innovative technologies while building an online catalog. Moreover, our AI technology disrupts the typical 2+ week product photography process, allowing businesses to scale and move their items online faster with an 80 percent decrease in time-to-market.

Spyne has raised $7M in their latest funding round (2022) led by Accel, the funding round also witnessed participation from other marquee investors including Storm Ventures, Smile Group, Pentathlon Ventures, Core91, and prominent founders/CXOs from leading Internet companies.

At CIOL, Sanjay Kumar, Co-Founder, and CEO, Spyne, has shared his perspective about Spyne building computer vision and AI technology to automate image processing workflows. This will help any business or marketplace shoot, edit, and publish product visuals at scale, at 1/4th the cost and time.

Tell us about Spyne and your offerings. Tell us about the team.

Spyne was formed in 2018 to use deep tech to solve the challenge of content management and distribution for photographers. We bring the industry-first computer vision and AI-powered solution to the product cataloging space, allowing businesses and marketplaces to create studio-finish images at scale, 10x faster, and at a much lesser cost. Our products are based on visual AI, which employs deep learning to comprehend visual intent more quickly than humans. For example- our all-in-one White label photo app + SDK solution allows businesses to take use of innovative technologies while building an online catalog. Moreover, our AI technology disrupts the typical 2+ week product photography process, allowing businesses to scale and move their items online faster with an 80 percent decrease in time-to-market.

The company was founded by Deepti and me. Deepti is the co-founder and Marketing and leads the company's marketing & branding initiatives; including all the employee-happiness programs. I am the CEO and Co-founder, and responsible for the company’s product & technology; strategically building the future roadmap. We currently have a team of 120+ people, with 40% working in technology, product, and AI services.

What are your growth priorities for 2022?

At present, we offer our services only to the enterprise segment. However, as we move forward, we intend to launch our products for the B2B2C segment as well at least for specific categories including e-commerce, fashion, food, and real estate.
For the auto segment, we have launched a 100% automatic AI Product in June 2021 and we are planning to acquire clients from the global markets that include car dealerships, marketplaces, and marketing and editing agencies.

In the upcoming months, we have plans to broaden our technological boundaries by developing AR/VR products for Metaverse and Omniverse, as well as replicating the auto model for the e-commerce, fashion, food, and real estate industries.

Tell us about the company funding details.

 We have raised $1M in a seed funding round and $7M recently in a pre-series A funding round led by Accel. The funding round also witnessed participation from other marquee investors including Storm Ventures, Smile Group, Pentathlon Ventures, Core91, and prominent founders/CXOs from leading Internet companies.

Our recently raised capital will be invested in acquiring the right talent, bolstering global expansion including the US market, and setting up a state-of-the-art computer Vision lab for deeper R&D in the space.

How did you come up with the idea? Any changes for Spyne?

 During our initial years, we realised that there is a significant gap in the way photos were made and supplied in the e-commerce industry, with a production time of 2+ weeks. To answer the challenge of cataloguing and streamlining image processing workflows, we began researching and developing AI technology. At the same time, we also noticed that the most difficult task for every vendor is to present their product and services in the best possible manner. To address this, we designed Spyne’sindustry-first computer Vision and AI-powered solution in the product cataloguing area that allowed businesses and marketplaces to create studio-finish photos. The entire process is 10x faster and is available at a considerably lower cost.

What has 2021 changed for you? How are things now?

In 2021, we launched a fully automated AI product for automobiles (Auto) and acquired initial few customers from across geographics. Only for car products, we currently have 22+ enterprise operations in India and global markets.

We are now concentrating on expanding our footprints in the US & European markets. We are also putting a lot of money into hiring and increasing teams across divisions, as well as global market expansion and R&D.

Our current revenue is $1-2 million. Our goal is to reach $5 million in revenue by the end of this year.

What are the drivers/market trends that are shaping the AI-driven start-up in 2022?

2021 was a great year for deep-tech companies. A massive digitization wave was all around triggered by Covid, resulting in a big influx of capital to help companies build solutions for the future.

Some of the trends that are shaping the AI-driven startup in 2022 and helping them launch products to help streamline time-consuming processes and bring more efficiency to the system are:

• Embracing cloud computing: AI-driven companies are using data in the cloud, allowing their employees, who are working remotely, to work from anywhere.
• Personalised experience: With the help of AI, companies can now track their customer habits and can even pay attention to their past purchases, helping them with products that they are searching for.
• Customer service automation: companies can now use chatbots to have human-like interactions with customers. Once you have answers to all the common questions via chatbots, agents can then solve problems on the fly.

Heavy investments in AI ecosystems by the investment community and increasing penetration of the internet across India and global markets and covid-induced push towards digitalization are some of the factors that will help AI-driven startups grow in 2022.

 How is Spyne tapping these market trends for growth?

 One of the biggest pain points for any merchants/sellers to go digital and sell online is to showcase their products and services in the best possible way through engaging creatives that help them get more clicks and sell better. Currently, this need is served by thousands of professional photographers and photo editors. There are multiple challenges here -  from finding a local photographer for the shoot to uploading on the Marketplaces, which takes up at least 2 weeks of time & effort, excluding the high costs.

At Spyne, we have been able to build unique deep-tech AI technology that helps create product visuals for catalogs at scale. We offer AI-Camera App for photoshoots, 100% automatic AI-Editing in real-time and instant publishing for online selling.

The entire cataloging and selling process is now easy, fast, and more efficient than anybody can execute anytime!

How has your revenue grown with the brand evolving during the pandemic?

We launched our first AI-powered product for Auto Industry in June 2021 and have been continuously adding features & solving use-cases for the industry.

We have also launched products for the food and e-commerce industry. Parallelly, we are also working on integrations with leading e-commerce marketplaces to help merchants launch their products online easily.

Now, with the acquisition of Travographer, we have plans to launch our AI-App-based shoot offerings in the real estate sector.