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Okkular
Techstars '23Melbourne, AU · Founded 2018 · 27 employees on LinkedIn · 2 known investors
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Okkular provides AI and deep learning solutions for retail, specifically helping fashion retailers automatically tag and categorize product images at scale. The platform improves customer experience and sales through visual AI-powered product attribute generation and discovery.
Also known as Okkular.io
Founders & leadership
Okkular was founded in 2018 by Abhishek Vohra, Ashwin Rao, and Vishal Ahuja.
Investors · 2
How we know: the Techstars portfolio · open dataset · Top 3000 Accelerator Startups (no YC) 2026-08 · Not right? Tell us
Company profile
researched Sep 2026Okkular provides AI and deep learning software for retailers, converting product images, product feed fields and API-supplied information into structured attributes, metadata and product content. The outputs are intended to support ecommerce search relevance, filtering, SEO metadata, product recommendations and visually similar product discovery, replacing manual tagging and rewriting work performed by merchandising and product-data teams.
The platform applies segment-level attribute hierarchies so that attribute sets stay consistent across categories, segments and sales channels, and can generate multiple channel-specific product descriptions (for example for a brand's own ecommerce site, Shopify and marketplaces such as Amazon) from a single product record, governed by the retailer's brand rules. Attribute examples cited by the company span apparel (colour, material, sleeve, length, occasion, category) as well as non-apparel segments such as lighting and outdoor furniture (product type, mount type, finish, shape, style). The company also positions the technology to keep similar-product and recommendation results current as new SKUs are added, and to surface alternatives on out-of-stock product pages.
Founding story
Okkular's co-founders experienced the manual tagging process first-hand while building a marketplace solution in 2018; finding that ecommerce stores of all sizes were still tagging products manually, they saw an opportunity to automate the task and started Okkular in early 2019.
Business model
Okkular sells AI-powered catalogue enrichment services to retailers, integrating with product images, product feeds and APIs to generate attributes, metadata and product descriptions at scale; the site directs prospects to request a demo.
Sale of AI-powered catalogue enrichment services to retail and ecommerce operators; specific pricing terms are not disclosed on the public site.
Traction
The website states the company is trusted by leading retailers and features a customer testimonial from Emma Filliponi of Australian retailer Blue Bungalow, who describes Okkular as providing customisable product data at scale to underpin product discovery, intelligent search, merchandising, filters and personalisation.
▸Full profile — market position, technology, go-to-market, geography, history
Market position
Okkular positions itself in the retail product-discovery and catalogue-data segment, framing poor product data as a revenue problem and citing third-party industry research on search abandonment and irrelevant retail search results as context for demand.
The company emphasises accuracy in visual AI, structured attribute frameworks and segment-level attribute hierarchies that keep outputs consistent across segments, categories and channels, and the ability to produce multiple channel-specific descriptions from one product record rather than a single generic description.
Technology
Deep learning and visual AI models that extract structured attributes and metadata from product images, combined with ingestion of product feed fields and API data, plus generative production of channel-ready product descriptions constrained by brand rules and segment-level attribute hierarchies; the system also powers visually similar product matching and recommendations.
Go-to-market
Direct sales to retailers via demo requests on the company website, supported by business development and partnerships led by the CEO, customer testimonials and an advisory board drawn from retail, technology and commercialisation backgrounds.
Ecommerce and retail businesses with large, fast-moving catalogues, originally fashion retailers and now multi-segment catalogues spanning categories such as apparel, lighting and outdoor furniture.
Geography
The company references Australian ties, including advisers from Australian retail and government-linked organisations and an Australian retail customer reference; it positions its offering for ecommerce players globally.
History
The concept arose in 2018 while the co-founders were building a marketplace solution and encountered the manual product-tagging process. After researching how other ecommerce players handled tagging and finding that stores — including some with hundreds of thousands of products — were assigning tags and attributes manually, the founders launched Okkular in early 2019. Products have since been developed and adapted based on client feedback, with a focus on visual AI for fashion retailers, and the current offering extends to multi-segment retail catalogues and channel-ready content generation.
Compiled by commissioned research from 5 cited public sources — announcements, filings, and press listed under research sources below.
Key figures
latest reportedCompany-reported or press-reported figures, each dated to when it was claimed — not independently audited.
Related companies · 3
Companies working in the same space as Okkular.
▸Research sources · 5
primary sources listed
- Okkularokkular.io · web
5 public sources were cited for this profile; the first-party ones are listed here.
Frequently asked questions
- What does Okkular do?
- Okkular is an Australian AI company that enriches retail product catalogues with structured attributes and channel-ready content.
- Who founded Okkular?
- Okkular was founded by Abhishek Vohra, Ashwin Rao, Vishal Ahuja in 2018.
- Who are Okkular's investors?
- Okkular's investors include Sydney Angels, Techstars.
- Where is Okkular headquartered?
- Okkular is headquartered in Melbourne, AU.