PiP looks to raise money for lost pet facial recognition app

There are a few facial recognition apps for mugshots, but ‘pugshots’ are mostly uncharted territory.

A startup from Canada has launched a new campaign on indiegogo, looking to aim money for an app which uses a form of facial recognition to identify lost pets.

Vancouver-based PiP – The Pet Recognition Company is looking to raise $100,000 in the next month to bring its app to market. The app works by analyzing unique facial features of animals and is reportedly able to recognize 98 percent of dogs and cats, with the help of some additional metadata like breed, weight, size and gender.

Owners using the app need to upload images of their pets to the system, which analyzes facial features and stores a template in a database. Once these pets are reported missing, the system scans social media postings for found pets and according to a TechCrunch report, there is also a person who scans metadata to reduce false positives.  

Beside scanning social media, the app sends out an alert to animal control, veterinarians and rescue agencies.  The group calls this an “Amber Alert” for missing pets.

People who find pets can download the app and upload a picture of the pet, and if the pet already exists in the system, it notifies the owner.

Facial recognition for animals is certainly a new innovation, and it’s interesting to see facial recognition used for an application that isn’t focused on human identification and recognition.

With 38 days left, PiP has raised about $1,700 of its $100,000 goal.

Article Topics

facial recognition  |  indiegogo  |  mobile app  |  PiP