L'Oréal has crowned four start-ups winners of its 2025 SAPMENA Big Bang Beauty Tech Innovation Program.
Halo AI from the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Heatseeker from Australia, and Sravathi AI and Without, both from India, all placed as winners in the beauty giant’s scheme, which sees start-ups compete for the opportunity to work with L'Oréal in a commercial pilot.
The start-ups competed in a rigorous process, tasked with addressing one of five challenge themes affecting the industry: 'Science for Beauty' (new for this year), ‘Consumer Experience’, ‘Content & Media’, ‘New Commerce’ and ‘Tech for Good’.
The programme is the biggest open innovation competition of its kind in the South Asia Pacific, Middle East and North Africa (SAPMENA) region.
The winners will have the opportunity to collaborate with L'Oréal in a commercial pilot with one of the group's 37 international brands, and gain potential exposure to 35 markets across SAPMENA.
Plus, enter a year-long mentorship with senior executives from L'Oréal and the programme's partners – Accenture, Google and Meta.
Wubble AI from Singapore also received a Special Mention at the competition finale.
"SAPMENA is one of the world's most dynamic regions, with millions of young, digitally-savvy consumers fuelling the rapid rise of digital commerce and brand innovation,” said Vismay Sharma, President of L'Oréal SAPMENA Zone.
“While Silicon Valley often comes to mind for start-ups, we believe the centre of gravity for innovation is increasingly diversifying and shifting to regions like SAPMENA, where market demand is shaping ideas to impact.
“The pitches at the ‘Grand Finale’ [of the competition] are a testament to this and reaffirm the opportunities for open innovation here.
‘By partnering with these next-gen innovators, we can accelerate the pace of beauty tech transformation and amplify the impact of new ideas across the beauty ecosystem."
Halo AI helps brands scale their content creator collaborations with artifcial intelligence (AI)-powered analysis to manage, vet and select creators; while Heatseeker enables marketers to run live, in-market experiments with real customers using its AI-powered platform, providing rapid and quantitative evidence.
Sravathi AI is a silico chemistry AI platform that designs and develops advanced pharma using AI, molecular modelling, biochemistry and chemical engineering; and Without is a material science enterprise ethically that transforms unrecyclable waste into high-quality, recyclable materials and products.
L’Oréal’s 2025 SAPMENA Big Bang Beauty Tech Innovation Program drew applications from Southeast Asia, India, the Middle East, Australia and New Zealand, reaching more than 50,000 start-ups.
The competition culminated in the ‘Grand Finale’ in Singapore on 7 November, where ten shortlisted start-ups pitched their “bold, scalable and tech-driven ideas” to a judging panel of industry experts from L'Oréal, Google, Meta and Veros Ventures.
"Meta is excited to support the Big Bang Beauty Tech Innovation Program,” commented Benjamin Joe, VP Asia Pacific, Meta.
“L'Oréal continues to set the pace for digital transformation in beauty, embracing new ways for people to discover, experience and express themselves online.
“As beauty increasingly intersects with technology through virtual try-ons, social discovery and personalised experiences – this initiative provides a powerful platform for start-ups to shape the future of beauty in the digital world.”
Sanjay Gupta, President, Google Asia-Pacific, said the company was pleased to “continue our partnership with L'Oréal, driving innovation through this programme”.
Gupta added: “As a region of tech-optimists and early adopters, the Asia Pacific region can deliver new ideas and transformative solutions for the world.
“The quality of submissions highlights the strong talent in this region.”
Lead image credit: L'Oréal.
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