Better Know A Barcelona Startup: Imersivo

This post was written in collaboration with German Leon, co-founder of Imersivo, Exipple and former European Director of Oblong Industries.

From the creators of Minority Report comes Imersivo, a Barcelona startup that has its sights set on revolutionizing retail experiences as we know them. The innovative project was founded just last year in conjunction with one of the former directors of Oblong, the company renowned for the development of the technology used in Minority Report which is used by companies such as Boeing, IBM and NASA.

As CTIO David Rotger explains, Imersivo is “an interactive platform that enables retailers to connect different silos of their business in an Omni-channel experience”. So what does that mean in English? Imersivo essentially provides a software for technology-enabled shopping, and a very different approach towards how retailers engage with the consumer, allowing a consistent experience across all of their channels – outdoor displays, web, mobile and retail displays. “We’ve hit an inflection point where technology is now so pervasive and so useful that the world of e-commerce and commerce are now just seamlessly merged, and everything is omnichannel. It’s not about the mobile phone or the desktop or the store—it’s about all of those” adds David.

I’ve seen a demo of the different facets of the product and it’s an extremely impressive product and thoroughly engaging. First off is the interactive gestural experience: imagine a storefront window with an interactive screen which you control by gestures. You can select the inventory, see how each item will look on a model (which you can move around with gestures or your mobile) and even go as far as purchasing items right on the screen. The retailer provides all of the content and screens so the product setup is relatively simple. Secondly comes mobile; an app to connect and interact with every display at the store and last but not least ‘the Cube’; a machine that allows retailers to distribute product at the window front, like a vending machine but better and substantially faster. Customers can make purchases online and Pick up the product at any location 24/7.

What Imersivo is doing is helping retailers commercially and efficiently exploit their real estate, where the showroom is a much smaller part of the footprint, and the inventory and the distribution centres become a more central point. “Shopping is as much about entertainment and engagement as it is about utility. Stores are going to become as much distribution and fulfillment centres as they are full-fledged shopping experiences” says David. “To be attracted away from devices into a shop, new customers require stimulation, theatre and sensory immersion. They expect environments to be: experiential, immersive, interactive, omniscient, immediate and goes beyond just buying things. This is what we are doing with Imersivo” adds German.

The all-star founding team has over 60+ years experience in interaction design, UX, industrial design, operations management and computer vision and has raised over €600K in seed funding. They are in the process of securing some very large clients but details on that will come soon!

We are already seeing that stores and malls are becoming more technology enabled and this is only going to get bigger in the years to come. The era of one human, one mouse, one screen, one machine is giving way to what’s next: multiple participants, interacting in proximity and remotely with applications and data spread across every display and every object. You want to be part of this.