L’Oréal Invests Generative AI Startup Rembrand
- Chaileedo Press
- Jun 14, 2023
- 2 min read
Rembrand, the generative AI product placement platform, has completed its seed funding round, raising $8 million led by Greycroft and UTA Ventures. The funding round also saw participation from BOLD, the VC fund of L'Oréal.
Rembrand, a generative AI-powered product placement platform, has completed its seed funding round, raising $8 million led by Greycroft and UTA Ventures. The start-up has also received external investment from L'Oréal's venture capital fund, BOLD, and venture firm Good Friends, which was started by the founders of AllBirds, Warby Parker, and Harry's. The funding will aid in scaling out Rembrand's solution and help close its initial seed round with the participation of major brands.
Rembrand is leading the way in developing a fundamental model for what it calls "Generative AI Fusion." This model allows for brands and other products to be seamlessly integrated into video content with hyper-realistic product placement, becoming a part of the story rather than an interruption.
Rembrand's technology operates using a method it calls "physics-informed" generative AI, meaning that virtual elements obey the laws of physics. Unlike feeding a prompt into an image or text generator, Rembrand analyzes each frame of existing video to understand lighting, shadow, reflection, motion, occlusion, and camera angle. This enables Rembrand to digitally insert a photo-realistic product image or animation into a creator's video, such as a can of OLIPOP soda on a side table or bottles of Garnier shampoo dancing into the frame and settling onto a background shelf.
Since its launch in February, Rembrand has already started working with numerous leading brands and content creators of all sizes, from individual YouTube creators to larger networks and studios who are looking to find ways to reach an increasingly challenging audience.
It is noteworthy that the team behind Rembrand, who have been successful entrepreneurs in previous companies, have for the first time taken brands as investors. CEO Omar Tawakol was previously the CEO of the data exchange and platform BlueKai, which popularized the concept of data separation from media buying in online advertising, eventually becoming the Oracle Data Cloud.
“Video is still growing dramatically as a primary channel for advertisers online, and brands want to make sure they have a solid way to command consumer attention,” said Tawakol, the founder and CEO of Rembrand.
“We felt it would be important to align with some leading brands who want to help craft the way organic video can be used, and who already understand the value inherent in the creator economy.” Tawakol added.
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