Have you ever been in a situation where you’d pay anything to understand a person’s emotions? Well, the price tag might surprise you. Just recently, publicly traded Swedish company Smart Eye acquired emotion-detection tech Affectiva in a cash-and-stock deal. The valuation? A whopping $73.5 million.
Affectiva has surely gone a long way since it was first conceived in an MIT Media Lab back in 2009. Just three years after it spun out of the lab, the startup raised $12 million in funding. Back then, it had two flagship products – Affdex, a facial coding tech, and Q Sensor, a wearable sensor.
It was software way ahead of its time. In fact, venture capitalist Mary Meeker said then that measuring people’s real-time emotions while watching videos can improve online engagement. As a result, the tech enables ventures to gear their videos to better appeal to their target market.
Before the $12 million funds raised in 2012, the startup previously earned early-stage funding amounting to $7.7 million. This round was from WPP, Myrian Capital, and the Peder Wallenberg Charitable Trust. Seeing that the startup has won not one but a few National Science Foundation grants, it was surely a tech to look out for even during its early days.
Aside from those mentioned above, Affectiva is also backed by Kleiner Perkins Caufield Byers, Horizon Ventures, and Fenox Venture Capital.
Affective Computing and the Future of AI
The startup was founded by two effective computing pioneers, Rana el Kaliouby and Rosalind Picard.
El Kaliouby, who served as the startup’s CEO, is now the Deputy CEO of Smart Eye following the acquisition deal. According to the Egyptian-American AI thought leader, she’ll be working with Smart Eye CEO Martin Krantz to scale the venture. Their top goal will be AI tech that focuses on ethics, equity, diversity, and inclusion.
Rosalind Picard, on the other hand, is the founder and director of the MIT Media Lab’s Affective Computing research group. Besides Affectiva, she’s also the co-founder of another startup called Empatica. The latter focuses on healthcare with AI tools for research and treatment.
Affective computing tools may sound like a sci-fi tool to some, but it’s actually more common now than ever before. In fact, 25 percent of Fortune Global 500 already uses Affectiva’s tech. In addition to that, over 1,400+ brands like Mars, CBS, and Kellogg’s use the platform to measure people’s response to digital content. Market research firms like LRW, Millward Brown, and Unruly also use the tech to acquire the data that they need for effective campaigns.
What Will Affectiva Bring to Smart Eye?
Just how will Affectiva tech boost Smart Eye? With the Swedish dabbling in auto tech and driver monitoring systems (DMS), it seems that the software will be used in transportation tech.
In a press release, Krantz said Smart Eye saw Affectiva as a great platform to bring the tech to market at scale. He also mentioned how Smart Eye aims to bridge the gap between humans and machines and improve road safety.
Besides its tech, the startup also brings with it the income and profit from its Media Analytics business. After all, 70 percent of the largest ad players in the world use the platform to gauge reactions to ads. In short, Affectiva’s data coupled with Smart Eye’s eye-tracking systems can provide a more holistic view of human factors research.
The two ventures were competing against each other in the past. But both parties know that their techs will be more powerful combined. Also, they found common ground in terms of tech ethics.
El Kaliouby said that both parties share the same culture and values and the same vision for the future. She also said that by joining forces, they can now work to offer better tech that both won’t be able to provide alone.
With the recent acquisition, Smart Eye will now have a footprint in the East Coast, with Affectiva’s office in Boston. Affectiva’s Cairo office, on the other hand, will be used to access skilled local talent.
Aside from its office in Gothenburg, Smart Eye also has offices in Detroit, Tokyo, and Chongqing in China. Its office in Germany is now in the works.
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