[Funding alert] AI startup Orbo.ai raises $1.6M from YourNest Ventures, Venture Catalysts

Mumbai-based artificial intelligence (AI) powered imaging and visual enhancement startup Orbo.ai raised $1.6 million in its Pre-Series A round of funding.

The round was led by YourNest Ventures and Venture Catalysts, with participation from Vinod Dham (developer of Intel’s Pentium microprocessor) and John Ason (an investor in Jet.com that was sold to Walmart). Existing investors Refex Capital also took part in the funding.

According to a statement released by the company, Orbo plans to use the investment to ramp up its AI-based research efforts and to further create a seamless and automated visual enhancement stack. 

ALSO READ

How conversational AI startup Yellow Messenger became an enterprise favourite by converting lea...

Founded in 2015 by Manoj Shinde, Orbo uses deep learning powered technology to automatically improve imagery and provide enhanced resolutions for pictures and videos on mobiles, laptops or display devices.

Commenting on the investment, Manoj said,

“This is a crucial point in our journey. The current investment has boosted our confidence in the R&D and IP-driven work in AI that we have been doing for a wide spectrum of industries in India and globally. The funding is fundamentally great news for the entire sector as it shows the appetite for such core tech and the scale or extensibility the sector possesses. We will be using the funds to provide superior technology solutions to our customers along with expediting our expansion and hiring plans across verticals such as R&D, engineering, product development, sales, and marketing.”

At present, Orbo.ai provides its technology solutions across multiple industries including media and entertainment, 5G, retail, and e-commerce. It has been working closely with organisations such as Intel to provide their core AI technology and jointly bringing research-based vision products on their hardware to amplify their new push into the AI sector.

Girish Shivani, Executive Director & Fund Manager, YourNest Venture Capital said,

“We are very happy to partner with Manoj and his team at Orbo, who have created core IP and proven that DeepTech companies from India can work successfully at the bleeding edge of technology to create world class products. The visual enhancement platform continues to find applications across multiple domains and will only gain more traction going forward as 5G technologies come into play globally.”

(Edited by Saheli Sen Gupta)

ALSO READ

Venture Catalysts expands to UK, aims to build network of 500 investors by 2020