Alumni HEC, Polytechnic Institute raise 2 million with artificial intelligence platform Veeton

Three alumni of the Parisian institutions École Polytechnique (Paris Polytechnic Institute) and HEC School of Management have raised 2 million euros to develop Veeton, a start-up that uses artificial intelligence to produce visuals for fashion brand photo shoots.

The pre-seed fundraising was led by Founders Future and Armilar Venture Partners alongside Kima Ventures (Xavier Niel), ZeBox Ventures and business angels including Julien Chaumond (Hugging Face), Xavier Court (Veepee) and Thibaud Elzière (Fotolia).

The technology developed by the deeptech company generates large-scale photo shoots from a simple flat visual of a garment. The ‘Deeptech Plan’, launched by the French government in 2019, is operated by investment bank Bpifrance. Its ambition? To make France a leader in disruptive technological innovation, via startups.

It is mobilising 2.5 million euros to achieve three objectives: to increase the emergence of deeptech startups; to ensure their growth; and to develop and strengthen the ecosystem.

Start-up Veeton, founded in 2023 by Flore Lestrade, Christian Kotait and Tristan François, offers its customers the possibility of creating an infinite number of images reproducing all kinds of styles and shapes in just a few clicks. All of this at a production cost that is up to ten times lower than that of a traditional photo shoot, as per the news release.

Is Artificial Intelligence replacing human labour? It might

Following Bernard Arnault's presentation of the LVMH awards at Viva Tech, which rewarded FancyTech, a Chinese start-up that has developed video production software using generative Artificial Intelligence, this is the second time that we have heard talk of AI replacing technical teams in France (in this case models, photographers, touch-up artists, make-up artists, hairdressers, etc.) without even mentioning the matter (as if it didn't exist).

The stated aim of Veeton? To speed up the digitisation of retail chains (brands or retailers), at lower cost.

Commenting on the news in a statement, Flore Lestrade, CEO and co-founder of Veeton, said: "In just a few months, we have won the confidence of leading investors and key brands in the fashion industry to develop our generative AI solution."

"Veeton is a lever for creativity on a large scale for our partners, and we are very proud to offer a solution that combines performance for the brand and inclusion for its customers," she concludes.

This article was originally published on FashionUnited.FR. Translation and edit from French into English by Veerle Versteeg.