CIO Bulletin

Perfect Corp. – Democratizing Beauty and Commerce through Cutting-Edge AI and AR Innovations

In the ever-evolving landscape of digital innovation, one company stands out as a beacon of transformation: Perfect Corp. With a steadfast commitment to leveraging the power of 'Beautiful AI,' Perfect Corp. pioneers advancements that redefine beauty and commerce on a global scale.

Distinguished for its relentless pursuit of excellence, Perfect Corp. garners acclaim for its unparalleled contributions to tech innovation and leadership. By delivering the most cutting-edge AI and AR beauty tech solutions, the company not only drives business growth but also crafts personalized consumer journeys that resonate deeply.

In an exclusive interview with CIO Bulletin, Alice Chang, CEO of Perfect Corp., shed light on how her company is reshaping the dynamics of brand-consumer interactions through the utilization of transformative technology solutions.

Interview Highlights

Q. Could you share the founding story of Perfect Corp? What inspired the creation of the business?

I founded Perfect Corp. in 2015 when I recognized a unique opportunity within the consumer beauty experience where AI/AR Technology could play an important role in elevating and advancing the consumer shopping journey. I recognized how AI and AR introduced new ways to solve existing consumer pain points and enhance the overall shopping experience for brands, retailers, and consumers.

During the early 90’s, when the internet was first introduced into our daily lives, I identified a myriad of possibilities in the online realm. As I moved into my career in the IT industry as CEO of Cyberlink (1997), I recognized the power and opportunity presented by technology, and the many ways technology could help enhance our everyday lives. Nearly two decades later, I had a vision for the practical application of AR and AI technologies in the beauty and fashion space.

I have always been a beauty lover, and as a beauty shopper, I saw firsthand how AI and AR tech could help shoppers find the right products and shades to match their preferences and needs.

Through the use of precise Beautiful AI and AR innovations, I knew that we could transform the beauty shopping experience, helping consumers visualize products digitally to find their perfect fit. It was in June 2015 that Perfect Corp. was born with the focus of re-imaging the consumer beauty experience. We have continued to grow and expand our business re-imagining the consumer shopping experience across beauty, fashion, and retail, with our comprehensive suite of Beautiful AI solutions.

Q. What are the flagship products or services offered by Perfect Corp? Could you highlight their key features?

Perfect Corp. offers the most comprehensive suite of Beautiful AI and AR technologies across the beauty and fashion industries. Our mission is to empower brands and consumers alike with Beautiful AI solutions that unlock new possibilities for engagement and personalization.

Perfect Corp. focuses on both B2B and B2C business models.

On the B2B side, we partner with over 600 brands around the globe, across beauty, fashion, technology, retail, and media, to integrate our Beautiful AI technology across multiple touchpoints along their consumer journey—online, in-store, in-app, and across social. Our flagship solutions include virtual try-on across an extensive range of categories including color cosmetics, hair color, and fashion accessories like watches, rings, and bracelets. Our award-winning AI skin technology allows skincare brands, dermatologists, and medspa providers to offer precise skin assessments in seconds, identifying up to 14 skin concerns, and delivering personalized skincare recommendations.

On the B2C side of the business, our award-winning suite of consumer apps flagship (including YouCam Makeup, YouCam Perfect, and YouCam Video) have amassed over 1 billion downloads globally. The immersive apps offer unique interactive try-on experiences powered by precise AI, AR, and generative AI technologies for beauty, fashion, and photo fanatics to discover, create, and experiment endlessly.

Q. With over 1 billion downloads globally, how does Perfect Corp engage consumers through its YouCam apps? What strategies have been most effective in encouraging consumers to virtually try-on products and styles using your technology?

The YouCam Suite of Apps continues to offer users exciting new features that allow them to experience cutting-edge technology in the palm of their hand.

The immersive app experiences invite endless creativity and exploration, inviting users to unlock an extensive universe of features, tools, and effects that take their photos and style to the next level. We also continue to partner with talented artists, along with movie production houses (like Paramount Pictures and Warner Brothers Pictures), to bring buzz-worthy interactive movie experiences to life in the app through fun filters and effects.

When developing new features and technologies to be deployed in our award-winning YouCam suite of apps, we stay laser-focused on our mission to solve consumer pain points and help users discover beauty in fun and immersive ways. Within our app community, we are continuously introducing new features and experiences at the forefront of digital innovation. For example, in 2023, we introduced a suite of new experiences powered by advanced generative AI. These tools allowed our app community to visualize themselves as hyper-realistic and creative digital avatars. We also introduced cutting-edge AI Fashion tools which allowed app users to visualize how they would look wearing various fashion styles and trends.

Q. You mentioned AgileHand™ as a fast path to asset digitization for companies entering the Metaverse. Can you elaborate on how this technology facilitates bringing products into the virtual realm with hyper-realistic results?

One element of AgileHand technology which makes it an easy entry for brands into the virtual try-on space is the integration of 2D to 3D modeling.

This automated tool has significantly impacted the digitization of hand and wrist accessories, allowing brands to digitize a complete collection of SKUs in a fraction of the time, using 2D images. This type of streamlined SKU integration allows brands the fast adoption of virtual try-on capabilities and facilitates brands leaning into a digital-first strategy to propel brand growth. Additionally, Perfect Corp.’s AgileHand technology is trained on real hand models with a complete array of gestures, skin tones, textures, as well as hand and finger sizes, to guarantee an inclusive, hyper-realistic virtual try-on experience. The solution is also enhanced by PBR (Physically Based Rendering) to simulate real-life physics, including built materials, textures, micro-reflections, light scattering, and more.

Q. Perfect Corp emphasizes environmental, social, and governance values. Please speak to Perfect’s ESG goals?

Perfect Corp.’s Beautiful AI and AR digital technology has made a significant impact on the beauty industry, helping hundreds of brands and retailers to operate more sustainably. The technology removes the need for physical beauty sampling—and the waste that comes with it—allowing consumers to try on products and discover beauty through an immersive digital platform. This, in turn, allows brands and retailers to minimize product and plastic waste, ultimately reducing their carbon footprint. These true-to-life virtual try-on tools also enable customers to make more confident and informed purchase decisions, resulting in a more satisfying consumer shopping experience that can decrease returns by 8%. Fewer product returns lead to less waste generated from product returns and shipping. One partner brand, which integrated Perfect Corp.’s virtual hair color try-on across their website, reported saving 56 tons of waste per year as a result of this digital-first solution.

Q. Can you share any notable success stories or instances where your products or services made a significant positive impact on customers or clients?

The impact of Perfect Corp.’s extensive technology offerings is seen across multiple industries and offers numerous benefits to companies and the community. Perfect Corp.’s unique AI and AR-powered solutions deliver a sustainable zero-waste alternative to product discovery and experimentation, helping brands to reduce their carbon footprint by eliminating the need for wasteful single-use sampling. The true-to-life virtual try-ons deliver unparalleled accuracy and precision on par with physical try-ons, helping brands drive more impactful customer experiences while aiding consumers in making more confident purchase decisions.

For example, in hair color, one partner brand, KAO, reported enormous reductions in plastic waste, upwards of 56 tons of waste per year, following the implementation of Perfect Corp.’s AI Virtual Hair Color Try-On, which helped to eliminate plastic hair bundle color samples. The game-changing technology, which allows users to scan a QR code (found in-store POPs and on the back of product packaging) to virtually try on hair colors in real time through AR technology, contributed to the brand’s Sustainable Development Goals (SDG), thereby bolstering ESG commitments, driving sustainability in beauty, and cutting CO2 emissions.

With over 600 globally recognized brands, including some of the most iconic beauty, fashion, and retail brands, Perfect Corp.’s AI and AR-powered virtual try-on technologies have transformed the consumer experience, helping brands enhance product discovery, boost consumer engagement, and create a more impactful shopping experience that drives sales. Perfect Corp.'s solutions have shown remarkable results such as 2.5x increases in sales conversion, further proving the impact of the technology.

Q. What is Perfect Corp's vision for the future in terms of AI and AR-powered tech innovations? Are there upcoming projects or developments that you can provide a glimpse into?

Our vision at Perfect Corp. is to democratize the consumer shopping experience through advancements in AI and AR digital tech innovations. Our industry-leading AI and AR-powered solutions introduce an interactive, personalized element to the shopping journey that draws on a more impactful connection between shoppers and brands. Perfect Corp. will continue to lead the way for the future of AI and AR technology innovation, developing groundbreaking solutions that solve consumer pain points and reimagine the shopping experience for consumers across all touchpoints- online, in-store, and across social. As we look ahead to 2024 and beyond, generative AI will be a major component of Perfect Corp.’s tech innovations. We plan to implement this groundbreaking technology into new solutions that can help consumers visualize beauty & fashion in immersive new ways.

Q. What is your final message to CIO Bulletin readers, as well as your current and future clients/customers?

Embrace change. The world is always changing so it’s important to remain flexible and embrace the opportunity to pivot and lead the charge in a new direction. It’s imperative that brands lean into the digital revolution and adopt AI technology as a pillar in their growth strategy. AI is the key to creating the most tailored, engaging consumer shopping experiences imaginable and the exponential growth that goes along with that. Lean in and embrace innovation every step of the way.