London-based Cortexica raises £2m from Touchstone Innovations

Cortexica, a visual search technology firm spun out of Imperial College, has raised £2m from existing investor Touchstone Innovations, formerly Imperial Innovations.

The London-based firm, which also has an office in San Francisco,  secured £3.9m in funding over the past year.

Cortexica’s AI-based technology mimics the processes found in the human visual cortex to recognise content from digitally captured videos and images.

Iain McCready, CEO of Cortexica, said: “We are delighted that Innovations is continuing its commitment and support for Cortexica with this further funding round.

McCready added: “This funding is a strong endorsement of the strength of our technology, with its expanded application providing significant scale to our commercial opportunity. As businesses in all sectors seek to improve customer service and boost operational efficiencies with the use of AI solutions, we are focused on building our customer base across a range of new applications and verticals.”

Cortexica says it has partnered with well-known retailers in the UK, US and Europe, including John Lewis, Macy’s and Zalando.

“Cortexica is a strong example of a growth business with a clear roadmap to commercial success and this is being demonstrated by the contracts it is winning. It has developed a robust and scalable AI-based technology solution, and has a first-class management team driving the business forward,” added Jon Edington, director of technology ventures at Touchstone Innovations.