Birdwatching has been a popular pastime for decades, but now a tech startup called Bird Buddy is bringing the hobby into the digital age with its AI-powered smart bird feeder, which can identify bird species and allows users to save photos and video of their feathered visitors. Bird Buddy is expanding its product line to include a Smart Hummingbird Feeder and a Smart Bird Bath, which will enable users to attract a greater variety of birds to their backyards. The company is returning to Kickstarter to fund the project and to offer early backers a discount on the products.
The Bird Buddy system includes an AI-powered mobile app that identifies bird species and allows users to collect photos and videos while engaging with a birdwatching community. Bird Buddy has around 100,000 active users, with a third of the users being new to birdwatching. The Slovenian- and Michigan-based startup has successfully identified 452 species with its own bird identification system, and its proprietary training system has been successful in identifying new birds through its expert review system which includes ornithologists.
Bird Buddy co-founders Ziga Vrtacic and Franci Zidar, teamed up with Kyle Buzzard, whose background includes work on the first Chromecast design, various Logitech cameras, and the Nest Cam to design the smart bird-feeder. The initial version of the app sent images and videos through as 'postcards,' but this has since been redesigned to be more user-friendly with a stream of updates with fast processing of images.
Bird Buddy’s bigger goals also include making its bird feeder data available to researchers, but the startup believes it has already created value beyond its hardware/software combination by way of its community of birdwatchers who chat, interact, and share tips and ideas with one another. As of the time of writing, the company has raised $912,045 of its $100,000 goal.
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