Z21 startup takes its place at Silicon Valley's Y Combinator accelerator

Aura Vision, a Z21 Innovation project, outshone thousands of candidates to join the latest cohort of the world-famous accelerator, which has launched countless global brands including Airbnb, Dropbox and Reddit.

They become part of Y Combinator’s winter 2019 cohort, taking their place among an impressive line of outstanding startup successes. To date, the accelerator has helped launch 93 companies that are now valued at over $100 billion, directly leading to the creation of over 28,000 jobs worldwide.

Aura Vision has built upon cutting-edge postgraduate research at Southampton to produce a visitor analytics platform for retail stores that measures and improves shopping experiences producing valuable insights into customer behaviour to help boost sales and marketing performance. Developed by machine learning experts at Southampton, the deep learning technology uses CCTV cameras to capture shopper information, without accessing sensitive personal information. The data helps retailers understand how shoppers move around and experience their stores. The startup was co-founded by Daniel Martinho-Corbishley and Jaime Lomeli during their PhDs in Southampton’s School of Electronics and Computer Science.

Z21 is an initiative founded by the Web Science Institute that is proposed to drive innovation into the real world. Its maiden project is a collaboration between the WSI and the Solent Local Enterprise Partnership (LEP). The mission of the Fund is to accelerate University of Southampton Web startups towards investment and rapid growth and create high-tech jobs in the Solent region.