Estonian design tech startup OCCO raises €750K seed investment

OCCO was advised on the seed investment round by Ellex team in Estonia led by Partner Ermo Kosk.

The design tech startup OCCO has raised a €750 000 seed investment round for its AI-powered platform that helps interior design professionals save valuable time on product search and project management. The main investor is Oliver Ahlberg, founder of Skeleton Technologies.

With a vision to innovate and modernise the interior design industry, the platform has digitised the product catalogues of more than 800 high-quality interior design brands from Europe. The company claims that having access to all of these brands in one source can reduce 27% of monthly working hours for interior designers.

OCCO’s co-founder and CEO, Ander Sõõrumaa, said: “OCCO’s AI-based platform already helps hundreds of designers, and we are constantly working on developing this product based on user feedback”.

Founded in 2016, the startup has already completed over 1,000 projects for companies such as Bolt, Pipedrive, Nasdaq, Sorainen, Thermory, Tallink, Confido. After becoming frustrated with the time consuming and archaic process of flipping through furniture catalogues to find the right piece for the interior design project, in 2020, OCCO shifted its focus to providing a digital solution for the interior design industry.

The database helps interior designers and architects find suitable products or alternatives faster than ever, thereby saving time and money. During the soft launch, Occo has already secured 250 users from the Netherlands and Estonia and increased its yearly revenue to €7 million.

Having just raised €750k in its first investment round, Occo is now bringing its tech to new markets in Europe, continuing to revolutionise the interior design sector.

Investor Oliver Ahlberg commented, “I think for many people it would seem rather archaic to buy a plane ticket from a travel agency or order something from a paper catalogue. But that’s the daily life of interior designers: paper catalogues, emails, resellers. OCCO’s aim is to innovate all that and that’s what appealed to me. I’ve always believed that if something was done the same way 15 years ago as it is today, it’s a great opportunity to create value.”

OCCO is an Estonian startup that has headquarters in Tallinn and Amsterdam. It was founded in 2016 and started as a project sales company working closely with architects, real estate developers, and B2B customers. The company now offers an AI-powered platform for interior design professionals.