10 Questions for a founder: Volumental

Just imagine: You are at home and getting ready to head to a party. You have the perfect clothes but no shoes to match. You pick up your phone, scan your feet, select a model and after a while, you pick up your custom-made and custom fit shoes from your 3D printer. Off you go. Party sucked but everyone loved your shoes.  Sci Fi?  not really. Based in Sweden, Volumental has developed software that can use depth cameras ( like your Kinect)  to perfectly scan your body parts for size and fit so that you will never again have to pick up a measuring tape. We sat down with Alper Avdemir, speaker at the upcoming LDV Vision Summit and co-founder of Volumental, to learn more.

A little bit of yourself, what is your background ?

My background is in Robotics and Computer Vision. I’ve been at NASA JPL Computer Vision Group, working on projects such as Google‘s Project Tango and DARPA Robotics Challenge. I have PhD in Computer Vision from Royal Institute of Technology, Stockholm. Volumental is the second startup I have co-founded and right now my main focus.

What is the driving reason for the creation of Volumental?

To enable a future where every product you buy is made for your measurements, so that customized products become a norm rather than a luxury.

What is Volumental’s ultimate goal ? Mapping the world’s human bodies ?

We envision a future where each product are made with the individual at the center of product creation. Volumental is at the epicenter of this change and one of the key enablers. Doing this would mean mapping the world’s bodies but it does not stop there.

What about privacy concerns ? Isn’t this providing even more personal
data on the web ?

The vision we see does not necessarily mean surrendering more of your data. There can be several solutions where people have every access to their data while still owning it.

I think this same goes for even mundane things like email, it would be better if each one of us owned an email server in our houses but history has shown vast majority of users prefer convenience combined with a certain level of established trust.

Can we imagine a future of scanning your feet and printing a pair of shoes on one’s personal 3D printer ?

Absolutely!

Besides e-commerce, where do you see your technology being used ?

We see bringing medical help to those who cannot afford it right now due to lack of expensive hardware or expertise as another important use for our technology. Today we are working with big companies in orthotics to make custom insoles and ankle foot orthotics more affordable and accessible.

Looking around the photo:tech space, what do you see that excites you?

I’m excited about mobile computation power exceeding Moore’s Law. My current obsession is drones that does computer vision. It has the right limitations (weight, battery, compute). Limitations inherently encourages innovative solutions in the CV space.

With the LDV summit coming up, what do you hope to get from it ?

Get to meet other stakeholders in CV and learn new things.

What would you like to see happening that technology cannot yet deliver ?

Fast and robust computer vision that works everywhere, on every device.

 

[ NDLR : Kaptur is a proud media partner of the LDV Vision Summit. Our readers get up to 25% off ticket price if  they use promo code : KAPTUR]

Photo by HKmPUA