Blackhoods Support K-Beauty Business With 'Curie AI' That Recognizes Even Customers' Intentions

- Blackhoods has developed "Curi AI," an AI-driven researcher that replaces traditional multiple-choice surveys with human-like, in-depth interviews to uncover customers' true motivations and emotions.
- The platform enables companies to conduct qualitative interviews with hundreds of participants simultaneously and receive a comprehensive analytical report in just two days, reducing costs to one-tenth of traditional research methods.
- Founded by serial entrepreneur Jesse Lee, the startup is primarily targeting the K-beauty industry's global expansion while also branching out into HR and market strategy sectors to eliminate business uncertainty.

Jesse Lee, CEO of Blackhoods / Source=Blackhoods

Listening to the voice of the customer is the fundamental bedrock of business. This is especially true in sectors like the beauty industry, where capturing the minute preferences of consumers is paramount. The most common method for market analysis has traditionally been the survey, yet these are often confined within the rigid "5-point scale" ranging from "Very Satisfied" to "Very Dissatisfied," making it difficult to uncover a customer’s true inner thoughts or specific needs. Conversely, conducting in-depth interviews with hundreds of customers manually is often thwarted by the massive hurdles of time and cost.

Blackhoods (CEO Jesse Lee) is a startup aiming to solve this structural dilemma of market research through Artificial Intelligence (AI). Their developed solution, Curi AI, is more than just a simple survey tool; it is an "AI Researcher" that engages in human-like conversations and asks probing questions.

The technology enables in-depth interviews with hundreds or more customers without mobilizing extensive time and manpower, with the capability to analyze results in just two days. Blackhoods emphasizes that it offers a new alternative for companies hesitant to conduct qualitative research due to budget and scheduling constraints, and will be particularly helpful for the "K-beauty" business, which has recently been gaining significant global attention.

CEO Jesse Lee is a serial entrepreneur who started as a management consultant and moved through founding a beauty startup in Singapore and serving as the head of a Company-In-Company (CIC) at Krust Universe, a subsidiary of Kakao. We met with Lee, who possesses both on-the-ground business intuition and data science expertise, to discuss the shifts in the research market driven by AI and the vision of Blackhoods.

- Your entrepreneurial background is quite diverse. We are curious about your journey through consulting, a beauty startup, the blockchain sector, and finally to where you are today.
: My journey began in 2014 during the mobile boom. I entered the startup world with a "coworking space" business and later moved to Singapore to launch CELUV, a K-beauty commerce platform. While it garnered attention as the first Korean company to receive local investment, I always felt an unquenchable thirst during operations: the difficulty of knowing "what customers are truly thinking." This concern persisted even as I studied at the KAIST(Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology) Graduate School of Data Science upon returning to Korea, and while leading a CIC at Krust Universe, Kakao's blockchain affiliate. Ultimately, I concluded that the essence of business lies in reading the customer's mind, and I founded Blackhoods in 2023 to solve this using AI technology.

'Curi AI' presented by Blackhoods / Source=Blackhoods

- How is Blackhoods’ Curi AI technically different from existing survey tools?
: If traditional surveys are like "multiple-choice exams" where you pick from set answers, Curi AI is like an "in-depth interview" where you converse freely. For example, if a consumer answers, "I don't like this cosmetic product," traditional form-based methods end there because they cannot ask "Why?". However, Curi AI asks follow-up questions like, "What specifically did you dislike? Was the texture too sticky, or did the scent not suit your preference?" It goes beyond merely collecting answers to understanding the context of the conversation and identifying the hidden intentions and emotions of the customer. While interviewing many people directly would take months, our "AIResearcher" can talk to multiple people simultaneously, allowing companies to receive an in-depth analytical report within just two days, regardless of the sample size.

- Can general employees, rather than research experts, operate it easily?
: That is the core competitiveness of Curi AI. Usually, conducting in-depth research requires expert help from the questionnaire design stage because it’s daunting to figure out what questions to ask to get the desired answers. However, we have completely removed this barrier using Generative AI technology. If a user enters just one line in the chat window, such as "I want to know why American women in their 30s like our brand's toner," the AI automatically identifies the purpose of the interview and designs the optimal question scenario. Anyone can start an expert-level in-depth study in just one minute without complex setups.

- From the perspective of companies using the solution, cost-efficiency is also important. What is your business model?
: Our core model is RaaS(Research as a Service). Previously, if a company wanted to conduct in-depth interviews, they had to outsource to professional research firms. This typically costs at least tens of millions of won and takes two to three months—a structure that only large corporations could afford. We have automated this process with AI and provide it as a SaaS(Software as a Service) model. Companies can conduct interviews with numerous customers at any time by paying a monthly subscription fee or purchasing credits as needed. We have reduced costs to one-tenth of traditional research outsourcing and shortened the turnaround time from months to just two days. This is the clear economic value we present to the market.

- Who are your primary target customers, and what are some actual use cases?
: Our primary focus is the "K-beauty" sector seeking global expansion. The beauty market is one where customer preferences are incredibly detailed. However, it is realistically difficult for Korean companies to directly interview local customers in the US or Japan. We can help overcome these hurdles.
Recently, a healthcare solution company that measures hormone cycles using the Apple Watch used our service. Ahead of their entry into the US market, Curi AI conducted in-depth interviews with a large number of local women, allowing the company to identify local needs and establish a marketing strategy in just two days. In essence, they read the inner thoughts of local customers from their own office without having to establish a local branch or go on business trips.

Various AI technologies that make up Curi AI / Source=Blackhoods

- Is expansion into other fields possible?
: Certainly. A representative example is the HR(Human Resources) market. We recently achieved great results when a job matching platform for women returning to the workforce (so-called career-interrupted women) adopted Curi AI. Those who have been away from the field for a long time often feel burdened by writing resumes. For them, our AI conducted comfortable voice interviews, much like a phone call. By inducing a natural conversation with questions like "What kind of work did you do in the past?" and "What are your most confident job skills?", we uncovered the hidden capabilities of job seekers and successfully matched them with companies. From the employer's perspective, it’s impossible to interview every applicant individually, but since the AIconducts the primary in-depth interview, it drastically reduces hiring costs and time. Every business area that requires "large-scale conversation" is our market.

- I heard you utilized the Initial Startup Package program operated by the Seoul National University of Science and Technology(SeoulTech) Startup Support Foundation. How helpful was it?
: It meant much more than just financial support. For an AI startup, R&D costs, such as GPU server operating expenses, are quite high, making early survival difficult. The support for prototype production costs from Seoul National University of Science and Technology acted as a crucial "priming water" for us to survive this period and advance our technology. Thanks to that, we could focus on enhancing the fundamental competitiveness of our product without the pressure of funding. Mentoring and networking were also a huge help. When you are immersed only in technology development, it’s easy to miss the crucial Business Model, but through expert mentoring, we were able to coolly verify and refine our business viability. Furthermore, being able to connect with Venture Capitals (VCs) or potential partners through the university's solid industry-academic cooperation network was like a "thousand-strong army" for an early startup that had to start from scratch. It essentially laid the foundation for us to do "business" beyond just technology.

Blackhoods is promoting Curi AI through overseas exhibitions. / Source=Blackhoods

- What are your goals for the future?
: In the short term, our goal is to establish ourselves as an essential partner helping "K-beauty" companies succeed in their global expansion. I want to help junior entrepreneurs avoid the difficulties of information gaps that I experienced while doing business in Singapore. In the long term, I want to create a new standard for the research market. When companies plan or improve products, I want Curi AI to be the solution that helps them clearly confirm the voice of the customer and make data-driven decisions rather than relying on vague "hunches." I want to be a reliable partner that reduces business uncertainty.

By Young-woo Kim (pengo@itdonga.com)