A secretive new AI startup out of Seattle led by technology industry veterans raised $4 million to help companies manage adherence to their brand guidelines.
GeekWire spotted a SEC filing last week that revealed new funding for MarkOS. The company’s CEO, Marius Ciocirlan, confirmed the new investment.
Ciocirlan was previously managing director at Techstars Seattle before the startup accelerator shut down earlier this year.
His co-founders at MarkOS are David Dawson, co-founder of recycling startup Ridwell, and Wesley Yun, former head of design at Asana.
MarkOS is developing software that uses AI to continuously audit a company’s brand assets such as photos, videos, text, and more. It is targeting large enterprises, particularly franchises or brands in highly regulated industries, that spend millions of dollars to make sure employees and partners use assets that align with brand guidelines.
MarkOS can also help companies create the brand assets themselves.
Ciocirlan told GeekWire that the company is staying quiet on additional details of its product and partnerships.
“Generative AI will enable non-creatives to become copywriters, photographers, and graphic designers,” he said. “Organizations fear this will lead to significantly more non-compliant content. We want to ensure that doesn’t happen.”
Ludlow Ventures out of Detroit and Bessemer in San Francisco invested in the pre-seed round, which included participation from Seattle firms Ascend and Breakers. Red Antler, Plug and Play, Four Acres Capital, and execs at companies including OpenAI and Nike also invested.
MarkOS recently opened an office in the Pioneer Square neighborhood in Seattle and plans to work five days per week in-person.
Before joining Techstars Seattle in 2022, Ciocirlan co-founded ShareGrid, a marketplace for filmmakers and photographers to rent and sell their equipment. The Seattle startup was acquired by Backstage.
He was also a product designer for Groupon, Kromatic Entertainment, and Samsung.
Yun worked on the WebOS operating system at Palm and held design leadership roles at Samsung, Lytro, GoPro, and Uber Freight.
Dawson was an early engineer at Zillow and co-founded Stash, a loyalty reward startup for independent hotels.
https://ift.tt/zX5WICq July 29, 2024 at 02:00PM GeekWire
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