What the business is
An AI platform for brands and retailers: search, shopping assistance, product enrichment and virtual try-on on one system.
The bet
Retailers don't need five AI point solutions; one platform spanning search, assistance, enrichment and try-on becomes commerce's operating layer, then other industries'.
Starting capital
$3.5M seed from a16z speedrun, NTT Docomo, Connecticut Innovations, Alumni Ventures and Monday Capital
How it started
Co-founders Ari Nazir and İlker Selim Zorluoğlu were in Bali when a gift for Zorluoğlu's two-year-old daughter died in a slow support queue. Nazir built the first prototype in a weekend.
What happened
Pilots converted into deployments: A101 uses it to move shoppers through a huge catalog; Mavi runs AI search and assistance. Loops' own comparison found sessions involving the platform showed roughly 83% higher observed purchase conversion — an observational result, not a randomized one.
What has to be true
AI arrived in ecommerce one workflow at a time — search here, answers there, descriptions elsewhere — leaving retailers to integrate fragments that never share context.
The platform bet compounds: better catalog data improves search, search gives the assistant context, and conversations expose where product information is weak.
Pilot economics prove willingness to pay: 64% of pilots converting to paid is the metric investors cite when a vertical bet graduates from demo to budget line.
A named anchor customer in a demanding category — A101's massive catalog — doubles as the reference sale for every other grocer.
What can be applied
Own one industry's whole workflow — catalog, context, conversation — and each AI feature sharpens the others; point solutions cannot compound.
Aftermath
As of October 12, 2026 the seed had just closed, with spending aimed at product development, customer deployment capacity and international expansion. a16z speedrun's Fareed Mosavat framed the thesis as platforms that can own more of the shopper journey, pointing to Loops' pilot conversion and early customer expansion as evidence.
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