Ikea acquires AI imaging startup

Ikea, the Swedish home furnishings and decor giant, has been one of the leaders among retailers when it comes to adapting to tech innovations that impact its business, being one of the first to launch augmented reality applications, partnering with others to develop smart home devices and launching a business unit to build that out further, investing in relevant startups, and even picking up of logistics startups to expand its reach. 

Now it’s taking another step in that trajectory with a tech acquisition: the company, by way of Ingka Group (founded by the founder of Ikea, and the primary franchisor of Ikea and owner of Ikea.com), has acquired Geomagical Labs, an AI imaging startup based out of Mountain View.

Geomagical Labs has not had a lot of fanfare, but quietly it’s been developing a number of computer vision-based technologies, reported Tech Crunch. 

Its first product, which allows a user to quickly scan a room using any smartphone, render that into a panoramic 3D picture in a few minutes, remove all the furniture in it, and then, in the words of Geomagical’s founder and CEO Brian Totty, “play dress up” by adding in new items to scale, will be implemented by Ikea into its website and apps to let people start to create more accurate visualizations of their spaces, and how they would look with Ikea pieces in them.

Full Content: Tech Crunch

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