In the burgeoning landscape of Generative AI (GenAI) startups, France has emerged as a notable hub for innovation. French Gen AI startups are actively contributing to the global conversation on artificial intelligence (AI), leveraging cutting-edge technologies to develop novel solutions, and firms like Mistral AI are competing head-to-head with Sam Altman’s GenAI giant OpenAI.
Now, a new French Gen AI startup Pimento that turns creative briefs into visual mood boards using GenAI is in the news for raising $3.2 million funding. The seed financing round was led by French early-stage investor Partech (known for its recent investments Orus and scnd) and Cygni Capital also participated in the round.
Additionally, several angel investors contributed to the round including Julien Chaumond (Hugging Face), Stanislas Polu (Dust), Thibaud Elzière (Hexa), Jean-Charles Samuelian (Alan), Igor Manceau (creative director, ex-Ubisoft), Jonathan Widawski (Maze), Alessandro Sabatelli (ex-Apple) and Nicolas Steegmann (ex-Stupeflix).
With the latest funding, Pimento has plans to launch new features, create a user-friendly design and improve the models to better fit the needs of creative projects, unlike the standard tools out there.
Gen AI tool for creative teams
Pimento is basically a specialised tool designed for creative teams working on various projects, including brand redesigns, ad campaigns, video games, and animation movies, and it aims to serve as a vital resource during the initial research phase. Further, it allows users to gather images, text, and colours, creating a reference document that guides and inspires the project.
During the initial stages of a project, there’s often a lot of back-and-forth, with clients and managers making frequent changes. This iterative process can lead creative teams to start from scratch multiple times. Currently, many creative professionals rely on platforms like Pinterest, Instagram, Behance, Canva, and Figma for inspiration and mood boards. However, Pimento aims to revolutionise creativity by incorporating AI into the creative process.
Story behind Pimento
Before launching Pimento in October 2022, Florent Facq developed Pass Culture, an app backed by the French Government that currently enables nearly 4 million young French people to enhance their cultural habits.Facq’s co-founder, Tomás Yany, spent two years as an AI researcher at Apple US, focusing on his passion for photography. Yany then returned to Paris, serving as the technical lead at Nabla, an AI health startup, for the past four years. The founders, Facq and Yany, connected during their time as students at Ecole Polytechnique in Paris, bonding over their shared enthusiasm for both creativity and technology.
Florent Facq, co-founder, Pimento said: “Being creative is not just about generating an image; it’s about creating a coherent and relevant universe, defining clear and powerful aesthetic intentions. Current generative AI models don’t meet these challenges. We need to push technology and interfaces even further.”
Tomás Yany, co-founder, Pimento said: “Pimento ignites the true spirit of the creative work: curating, guiding, selecting. More than ever, the trained and professional judgment of creative people is crucial for ensuring coherence and relevance. AI brings out the best of them.”
