Checkout-free technology firm Zippin has closed a $30m series B funding round, bringing the Californian company’s total funding to more than $45m.

This round comes on the heels of significant progress the company has made in recent months, including signing numerous new accounts, launching multiple public checkout-free stores, and solidifying its technology within the future of retail.

Zippin powers checkout-free stores across four continents, in diverse retail formats such as convenience stores, grocery stores, sports stadiums, hotels and residential buildings. This funding round will enable Zippin to scale its checkout-free platform and power tens of thousands of stores by 2025. Users include the world’s largest food service providers Aramark and Compass Group, Japan’s third largest convenience store chain Lawson, and Brazil’s largest retailer Americanas, all of whom are expanding their checkout-free store footprint rapidly.

The multi-modal AI technology can deliver better than 99.9% accuracy even in stores with high shopper density and a complex selection of products, including unbranded and small-sized items. It works equally well in newly constructed stores and existing store retrofits.

The funding will help Zippin accelerate the pace of innovation in the areas of deployment and maintenance, where past initiatives such as Zippin Cube have already cut time-to-deployment by a factor of five. Zippin’s goal is to retrofit stores within a single day with zero or minimal down time for retailers.

“Zippin has seen increased demand and rapid adoption of checkout-free technology during the pandemic,” said Krishna Motukuri, Zippin’s co-founder and CEO. “Shoppers want contactless experiences everywhere they go. As retailers realise that frictionless checkout-free technology is also contactless by design, they see a great opportunity to kill two birds with one stone. With a checkout-free platform like Zippin, retailers can offer shoppers what they are looking for today, and future-proof their business, both at the same time.”

The funding round had participation from new and existing investors including OurCrowd, Maven Ventures, Evolv Ventures and SAP.

“Their technology advantage is one of the main reasons we chose Zippin,” said Jon Medved, CEO of OurCrowd. “We evaluated several companies in this space and found Zippin to be the clear leader with most stores in public settings. Many of the Zippin-powered stores in sports venues can attract up to 500 shoppers in a single hour, putting the underlying AI to the ultimate test. Zippin’s continued growth in such challenging environments is evidence of their superior technology, and also a competitive advantage, allowing their AI to train on some of the richest datasets provided by those challenging environments.”

The patent-pending technology uses AI, deep learning and sensor fusion, banishing checkout queues and self-scanners, and allowing shoppers to zip in and out with their purchases. The platform leverages product and shopper tracking through overhead cameras, as well as smart shelf sensors, for accuracy even in crowded stores.

Founded by industry veterans from Amazon and SRI with backgrounds in retail technology, AI and computer vision, Zippin has offices in San Francisco, Dallas, Toronto and India.