Sowilo raises undisclosed pre-seed for AI fashion product data tool

Icelandic AI startup Sowilo has raised an undisclosed pre-seed round to expand Catecut, its fashion product intelligence platform, and support the global rollout of its Shopify app. The company named Iceland’s Kría fund, TGC Capital, which is based in the Netherlands and India, and angel investors from Iceland and Australia as participants.

Sowilo did not disclose the size of the round, valuation, revenue, headcount or ownership terms. That leaves the financing signal limited to investor participation and the company’s stated plan to sell Catecut to more fashion retailers outside Iceland.

Founded by Heiðrún Ósk Sigfúsdóttir, Sowilo has built Catecut as a platform-agnostic product content tool for fashion commerce. The company says the software uses AI to recognize products and design attributes from retailer product images, then produce product titles, descriptions, metadata and tags for online listings.

Shopify app is the near-term distribution bet

Catecut is now available globally through the Shopify App Store. According to Sowilo, the app lets retailers create multilingual product copy tailored to a brand’s style, revise existing listings, generate image alt text and optimize metadata for search and discovery through generative AI systems.

The Shopify launch gives Sowilo a clearer route to smaller and mid-sized retailers that already run storefronts on the platform, while the company continues to pitch larger retailers directly. Sowilo says Catecut is already being used by jewelry and apparel retailers in the United States and has been tested with international enterprise retailers. It did not name those customers or disclose usage volumes.

The product sits in a crowded area of commerce software where retailers are trying to reduce the manual work involved in product page creation. For fashion sellers, that work can include identifying garment details, maintaining consistent naming conventions, writing localized copy and producing metadata that can be used by search engines, marketplaces and internal merchandising systems.

Sowilo’s pitch is that image-based product recognition can speed up that workflow and standardize listing data. The company has not disclosed accuracy metrics, customer retention data or productivity benchmarks, so the operational impact remains a company claim rather than a reported performance measure.

Funding goes to product and customer expansion

Sigfúsdóttir, Sowilo’s founder and CEO, said the investor backing will help the company bring Catecut into additional channels and markets, including emerging fashion retail brands and international enterprises.

Sowilo said the pre-seed funding will be used for continued Catecut development, international customer growth and faster adoption of the Shopify app among fashion retailers. No timeline was provided for new product releases, enterprise deployments or the next funding round.

This story draws on original reporting from Tech.eu.