At the Connecting Ideas With Money session on the 12th of November, 2022 founder Balaji pitched Zipydo – a Bangalore based vision/AI solutions company focused on serving D2C and retail brands. It is building unmanned, checkout-free convenience store for D2C and retail brands. Rapid offline expansion and last mile visibility are key values.
website:https://zipydo.com/
Demo:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Hoktga_tVI
“We bring together consumer’s need for instant delight and experiencing new products with brand’s need for user acquisition and cost effective offline expansion,” says Balaji.
“We offer consumers a hassle free experience of just walking up to a Zipydo store, opening the door with their Smartphone, pick any product or sample they want to buy or try and shut the door. Our vision technology will recognize what has been taken and bill the consumer as applicable. We also help the brands with the backend tools and data analytics to stock and manage the store to maximize their sale or marketing goals.”
The startup stumbled on to this problem and solution partly based on their own experience of online/App-based ordering. They were frustrated by waiting for deliveries. They also discovered that brands are looking beyond online/aggregators for a new channel which offers them more control cost effectively.
The founders then used their own funds and FFF funding to build a solution. They have piloted it at multiple sites to validate the technology and consumer traction.
They are currently working with their first customer.
Team:
The two founders Kanda Shanmugam and Balaji NV were colleagues at Sasken in the early 2000’s. Although they moved out of the company, they kept in touch as they came from the same hometown. They would meet now and then on long weekends, as they was only one train connection and discuss ideas on the journey. When they hit the right idea they decided to launch Zipydo Technologies
Balaji N V, Co-founder
Masters, CS, IIT Delhi
Ex-Samsung, 23 years experience – mobile platforms, Apps, IoT
Concept to roll-out of image recognition platform and visual shopping App
Kanda Shanmugam, Co-founder
IIT Bombay and IIM Bangalore Alumnus
24 years experience – business development, senior leadership in a start-up
Building and selling products, mainly hardware and embedded software products.
