Virtual fitting room service Fits.me has closed a £5m Series A round, which will allow the company to expand into new territories
Fits.me’s £5m Series A investment has been subscribed by existing investor SmartCap and new participation from Conor Venture Partners, Fostergate Holdings Limited and The Entrepreneur’s Fund. The investment will be used to expand Fits.me’s international expansion into France, Germany, other European countries and the US.
“We are gearing up for explosive growth into new markets,” Fits.me co-founder and CEO Heikki Haldre tells Tech City News. “We have proven technology and a proven business model, and this money will help us to expand within Europe and into the US market.”
Fits.me develops and operates virtual fitting room solutions on a software-as-a-service basis for online clothing retailers.
Robotic mannequin
Male and female robotic mannequins are used to mimic any size or shape of body and are dressed in representative items from the retailer’s range, in each available size. As the mannequins morph through thousands of body shapes, photographs are taken to build a large image database which retailers can then use through Fits.me.
“This is photo-realistic technology that allows customers to enter their clothing measurements and see how the clothing fits their body,” explains Haldre. “By using Fits.me, retailers can overcome the problems of low online conversion rates and high garment returns rates caused by doubt over fit and poor fit.”
The company already counts many well-known brands among its clients, including Adidas, Ermenegildo Zegna, Hawes & Curtis, Hugo Boss, L.K. Bennett, Superdry and others.
“While large swathes of retailing already takes place online, there are sectors for which the real online growth has yet to come,” adds Conor Venture Partners’ Manu Mäkelä.
“Apparel is chief among those sectors, primarily because buying clothes is such a subjective process – most obviously when it comes to ‘fit’. Fits.me is easy for retailers to deploy and has been signed up by a growing band of respected retailers and brands, on an international basis. There is tremendous growth potential.”
In May 2009 and August 2010, Fits.me received total seed and early-stage investment of just under £1.75m from Smartcap and angel investors, as well as £0.5m in grants.