AI Startup Cradle Global Startup Academy <2> Kim Doyeop, CEO of Viewmagazine
"ViewMezin's AI vision and autonomous drone solutions are technologies that are even more necessary in the post-COVID-19 era." Kim Do-yeop, CEO of ViewMezin, said he is focusing on technology development with an eye on the period after the novel coronavirus infection (COVID-19). As the contactless (untact) trend spreads, remote monitoring solutions are expected to be introduced in various fields, and ViewMezin's solutions based on artificial intelligence (AI) and autonomous drone technology are confident they will shine. We talked about ViewMezin's autonomous drones, which are ready to soar into the global market overcoming COVID-19, and the AI technology applied to them.
On the 26th, CEO Kim said in an interview with Asia Economy, "We are developing solutions that use AI and autonomous drones to monitor various infrastructures and detect defects." Based on the idea of an image recognition-based defect detection solution, Kim founded ViewMezin this year. Although a newly established startup, its core competencies?AI defect detection and drone attitude control technology?are already solid enough to be applied to inspecting abnormalities in pipelines and gas pipelines. Kim explained, "The drone recognizes the inspection target such as pipelines, automatically plans the route, and can immediately respond by identifying obstacles around during flight. After the inspection is complete, it automatically returns to the charging station, and customers can check all flight processes and inspection results in real time."
In the case of pipeline inspection, it used to require direct human confirmation, but applying this technology can significantly reduce costs and time, according to CEO Kim. He said, "While human personnel have the advantage of using various equipment, it takes 10 to 12 hours per kilometer. Using ViewMezin's solution can increase efficiency by at least 24 times per distance relative to cost." Especially, this technology is important for directly detecting defects, finding causes, and providing accurate location guidance for the rapid recovery of response teams. CEO Kim emphasized that ViewMezin's Chief Technology Officer (CTO), Lee Hoon-soo, has rich experience in this technical field. This was the reason he recruited the CTO after more than ten attempts of persuasion. Kim also focused on securing deep learning technology by composing most of the team with AI experts.
The support from the Small and Medium Business Corporation's Global Startup Academy played a significant role in building ViewMezin's technological capabilities. After entering the Global Startup Academy in July this year, CEO Kim received the '2020 4th Industrial Revolution Excellent Company' award and is currently advancing business sophistication by matching with 500 Startups, a global top-tier accelerator. He said, "Through the education and skilled mentors of the Global Startup Academy, we were able to prepare strategies and development roadmaps more concretely. Especially, we learned a lot about development methodologies from active engineers from NVIDIA, Intel, and Microsoft, which helped improve our resilience for long-term success."
The background behind CEO Kim steadily developing the business model lies in his experience. He is an international expert who worked at the United Nations (UN) and gained experience in the Middle East region. During this process, he confirmed that although computer vision technology is applied in various fields, the adoption of technology for industrial infrastructure requires a higher level of accuracy and reliability, making progress relatively slow. He said, "Seeing the market potential, I decided to challenge the inspection and management solutions for industrial infrastructure. We expect to provide value that can prevent tangible and intangible property damage and human casualties caused by unexpected accidents."
Although ViewMezin is a startup founded this year, it is registered as a vendor with the UN based on CEO Kim's experience. In addition, in June, it won a government project in Abu Dhabi and signed an initial order contract worth $1.2 million for proof of concept (PoC). ViewMezin is currently focusing on building technology references in the domestic market rather than immediate overseas expansion due to COVID-19, which is why it is looking forward to the time when it can actively operate in the global market. CEO Kim emphasized, "Among global markets, we will expand our business targeting the U.S. market, which shows an annual growth rate of over 10%."
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