AlgoFace’s facial analysis tech gets boosts from Microsoft, National Science Foundation

Call it a banner year to date for Arizona-based biometric facial analysis firm AlgoFace, which has released a trio of announcements celebrating strategic and financial wins.

First is its inclusion in the Microsoft for Startups program, which supports early-stage startups as they scale their businesses by providing Azure credits, AI services, technical and ethical support and mentorship opportunities. “We are honored and excited to have been accepted into the Microsoft for Startups program,” says Andrew Bart, CEO of AlgoFace. “This partnership opens up a wealth of resources and expertise that will enable us to accelerate our growth and deeply engage with the Microsoft ecosystem.”

Next on the company’s list of achievements is being awarded, in February, a $150,000 grant by the Arizona Commerce Authority (ACA) as an Awardee of the Arizona Innovation Challenge (AIC), among the largest business plan competitions in the U.S. Now it has received an even bigger cash injection, in the form of a $275,000 Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) grant from the U.S. National Science Foundation (NSF). A release says the money will be used in conjunction with two of AlgoFace’s patents to conduct research and development on their Face Analyzer/Semantic Search technology, “an AI-based system that can locate facial attributes in photos via descriptive text searches without requiring a probe photo.”