Montreal-based C2RO, a startup specializing in artificial intelligence-powered enterprise products for retail applications, has closed a $2.25 million Series A round.

The company said its Engage and Perceive products can help drive transformation in retail and commercial industries.

The round was led by Fonds Innovexport, with participation from GCI Capital, Harbor Street Ventures, Tandemlaunch, Ministère de l’économie et de l’innovation, and several angel investors in Canada, the US, and Europe. The company said the funds will be used to accelerate the commercialization of C2RO’s enterprise-grade cloud AI services.  

“We welcome the support of our new and existing shareholders, which will allow us to expand our current customer deployments and pursue new and exciting opportunities for our portfolio of AI products both here in North America and abroad,” said Riccardo Badalone, president and CEO of C2RO. “I’m incredibly excited about our Engage and Perceive products, which are proving themselves in the field and are allowing us to assist an increasing number of early adopters with their digital transformation objectives.”

C2RO uses proprietary real-time cloud AI to provide data-driven businesses with analysis and recognition tools, aimed at turning physical spaces into interactive smart environments. The company’s technology is designed to allow customer service robot platforms to be used for advanced human interaction and behavioural analysis in various commercial and retail environments. Founded in 2016, C2RO had previously raised $1.4 million CAD ($1.1 million USD) in seed financing led by Chicago-based Harbor Street Ventures.

“We led the investment in C2RO because it has an excellent execution team, a significantly expanding Tier1 customer base, and a formidable technology position in the field of real-time machine vision AI,” said Richard Bordeleau, president of Fonds Innovexport. “C2RO will have a tremendous impact on the industry and we want to support them through this journey.”

The company said its two products can help drive big changes in the retail and commercial real estate industries, toward unique, data-driven, interactive smart environments. According to C2RO, the global market for AI analytics solutions in retail and commercial real estate will exceed $5 billion USD by 2022, and is growing at a compound annual growth rate of 40 percent. The company says this growth is being driven by global retail and commercial brands that are mixing digital and physical assets to offer new, highly personalized experiences to consumers.