Early Stage Startup Fund Quarizon Backs Product Photography Startup Pictor Imaging

Product photography startup Pictor Imaging has secured an undisclosed amount in funding from Quarizon, a Delhi-based early-stage startup fund.

The funding will be used to strengthen its team, technology and for marketing purposes.

Mumbai-based Pictor Imaging was launched in November 2015 by Neelesh Soni, Siddharth Chilukuri, Gaurav Raj, and Akshay Sathaye. The startup leverages computer vision technologies to enable online sellers to use their smartphones to get studio quality product images for their catalogues. With Pictor, ecommerce businesses can reportedly standardise and scale their product digitisation workflows in a reduced turn-around time and costs.

Neelesh Soni, CEO and co-founder, Pictor said, “Currently, this unorganised industry is a constant source of dissatisfaction for customers. We felt that many of those problems related to accessibility, reliability and transparency could be solved with technology and operational excellence. Our mission at Pictor is to make product imaging standardised and more transparent. Using image processing algorithms and machine learning, we provide the most advanced and automated solutions in the industry. We want to make these technologies available to as many sellers as possible.”

The company plans to automate the backend process by using deep learning and computer visions. It aims to achieve 50% automation by the next year, according to an official statement.

Commenting on the investment, Rajiv Semwal, investor, Quarizon said, “With the evolution in the online space, especially the ecommerce businesses, the market for product photography is huge and indeed much in demand. We saw immense potential in Pictor and their vision to make a mark globally. The company is poised to become the de facto method for the major ecommerce players for product photography.”

In April this year, online marketplace for photography, Picsdream raised angel funding led by Raman Roy (co-founder, Indian Angel Network). In August 2016, Bengaluru-based online photography startup, Canvera Digital Technologies raised $3 Mn (INR 20 Cr) in a new funding round led by Info Edge (India) Ltd.

Other startups in the space include Photodilse, Siftr, ZoomIn etc.