You. Hey everyone, michael here from ACB 23 having a blast. And I'm standing next to Michael, whose name I probably shouldn't forget. He's from Oko and I happen to run upon him. Hey, Michael. How are you?
Good. How are you, Michael?
I'm doing great. Hey. So what is Oko?
Yeah, good question. So what Oko? Is it's a mobile app these days? Only for iPhone. But what we do is we use your smartphone back camera to visually interpret the pedestrian signal. So here in the US, that's the walk sign, the Do Not Walk sign and the countdown sign. So we visually interpret that using artificial intelligence and we pretty intuitively bring that information back to you whether that walk sign is on or Do Not Walk sign is on through three types of feedback. Actually, one of them is an audible cue, the second one is a vibration cue, and the third one is a visual cue. So the screen lit up green and red to indicate that don't walk or walk sign.
So does the municipality have to do anything special for this to work for people or does it just work with anything?
Yeah, so generally it works with everything because we indeed visually interpret the light like a sighted person would do. For example, I do need to say that the application is for free. So I'm originally from Belgium but living now in New York. But the vision from day one has been always the fact that if a sighted person doesn't need to pay to look at a traffic light, nor should blind and low vision pedestrians. So that's why we're providing this app for free. But ultimately we want to work with cities or maybe healthcare to facilitate that free charge and basically let them pay on behalf of their citizens, individuals. So that's how our main goal looks like.
Perfect. It makes me nervous when companies say their app's free. I love it. But then you always wonder, well, where's the money going to come from? So it sounds like you guys have a strategy for that already.
Yeah, here in the US, we're pretty much focused right now on user growth. So we've been live for the past three months and we've already helped cross 200,000 intersections in those three months, which is an amazing amount. So that's like our focus right now and then turn that into a commercial plan. But we are backed by international venture capital, so that's pretty great to sustain the business right now. But then of course, ultimately we need to change to a commercial plan or strategy, if you call. But that's more like down the line.
But the plan isn't to at some point say, hey, let's charge all the users now because you want to keep that free, which makes sense. Now, if I download the app, do I create an account or can I just use the app? How does that process work?
Yeah, good question. So the app is available here in the US. You don't need to create an account, so there's basically some three or four onboarding screens just to inform you what it's all about and everything, granting access to the camera, to GPS and those things. And then you'll be just in the app, and you can just use it wherever you would like to.
Beautiful. One last question. How do people get more information and can they get in contact with you directly?
Sure thing. The company is called Ice, which is spelled Ayes, and it actually is an acronym for Artificial eyes. So the company behind the Oko app, of course, is Ice, and you can find more information on WW, ayes AI, but you can also always reach me out to Michael at ayes AI.
And Oko is Oko. Is that correct?
Yeah, that's correct.
Oko available in the United States only at this time. Do you guys have any plans to expand or do you know yet?
Yeah, so we're originally from Belgium, so Oko also exists in Belgium. It also exists in Spain, Japan, and also US. So four countries right now.
Okay, well, that is exciting. Thank you, Michael. Really appreciate it. And you have a beautiful day.
My pleasure.