Two major Russian corporate funds, Rusnano Sistema and the IIDF, have just announced an investment in Texel, a startup which has designed an advanced 3D scan technology.
The capital injection, which amounts to 110 million rubles, or $1.46 million at the current exchange rate, will be used to boost Texel’s international expansion. Over the past two years, the Russian startup raised 51 million ruble (around $810,000) round from the IIDF and an undisclosed amount from Marks & Spencer, through the British firm’s corporate accelerator Founders Factory.
In 2018, Texel also received a 28.44 million ruble ($430,000) research grant from Skolkovo.
Texel touts its scanner as being “rapid, reliable and precise:” scans take just 30 seconds and produce a 3D model in one minute. Not only is this technology used for virtual fitting rooms, with users scanning their body from their smartphones or simply sending a picture, which will be analyzed using articficial intelligence.
Texel says its scanner can also create avatars for the entertainment industry and for artistic purposes. It can also help study the human body by “automating the collection of anthropometric data,” and be used for medical purposes to “track the progress of exercising and to rate weight loss or muscle gain progression.”
Texel claims to have accumulated more than 1 million 3D photos from 25 countries, with the stated goal of “digitizing the entire planet.”
The company was launched in 2014, but the technology originated in 2007 from a scientific project of the Lomonosov Moscow State University (Graphics and Media Lab, Faculty of Computational Mathematics and Cybernetics).
Rusnano Sistema (also known as Rusnano Sistema Sicar) is a joint fund of Rusnano and Sistema, launched in 2016. The IIDF (FRII in Russian) has been the largest startup investor in Russia since its inception in 2013. This fund was recently backed by Rostelecom, the national telecom operator.
