Simporter, an Atlanta, GA-based SaaS startup that uses Artificial Intelligence to predict consumer demand for new products, closed a $600k seed funding round.

The round was led by Startup Wise Guys, with participation from angel investors from Denmark, Estonia, Japan, and other regions. Mitch Barns, former CEO of Nielsen Inc., also invested and joined Simporter’s advisory board.

Led by Dillon Hall and Tim Hall, Simporter provides an AI software platform that predicts sales for consumer products before and after they go to market. Manufacturers and retailers use it to pinpoint which products consumers truly want and how often they’ll buy. The proprietary technology analyzes billions of data points from point-of-sales, social media sentiment, and customer reviews.

The company is based in Atlanta, Georgia with its development team in Kyiv, Ukraine.

From 2014-2018, Barns served as CEO and member of the board of Nielsen, an S&P 500 company that operates in +100 countries. He advanced through levels of increasing responsibility over two decades with Nielsen, having started his career at P&G. Currently, Mitch helps lead strategy and operations of non-profit Global Leadership Network and serves on the boards of Zappi, The Stable, and advisory board of private equity firm Growth Catalyst Partners. Barns joins Ben Strom on Simporter’s board. Strom began serving one year ago and brings 18 years’ experience as a portfolio manager and analyst at a variety of institutional firms ranging from long/short equity hedge funds to global asset manager PIMCO.