China-based artificial intelligence (AI) technology startup Aibee has received RMB100m ($15.7m) in funding from shopping centre operator K11, China Money Network reported on Tuesday.
Founded in 2017, Aibee develops enterprise software tools based on AI-related technologies such as computer vision, speech recognition, natural language processing and big data analytics.
K11 and Aibee plan to collaborate on technologies and models that improve K11’s retail operations, and are considering areas such as facial recognition or product identification in individual stores, or augmented reality and voice recognition systems in shopping centres.
Aibee attracted $25.6m in a January 2018 angel round led by venture capital firm Kinzon Capital, a subsidiary of conglomerate Fosun, that included Lenovo Capital and Incubator Group, a corporate venturing arm of electronics producer Lenovo, according to China Money Network.
The round also included Sequoia Capital China and ZhenFund, and valued Aibee at more than $800m according to the Financial Times, which cited two investors familiar with the matter.