\nBird Buddy introduces an AI-powered Smart Hummingbird Feeder and Bird Bath<\/br>
\n2023-05-16 21:51:02<\/br><\/p>\n
Bird Buddy<\/a>, the AI-powered smart bird feeder, is bringing the popular pastime of bird-watching into the digital age \u2014 and growing its line of products in support of the hobby. With the startup\u2019s original affordable bird feeder, connected camera, and companion mobile app, birdwatching enthusiasts and newcomers alike can view photos and videos of bird visitors from their own backyards, which Bird Buddy identifies for you and then allows you to save privately or share with the broader Bird Buddy community. Today, the company is expanding its lineup to also include a smart hummingbird feeder and a smart bird bath.<\/p>\n First launched in 2020, initially as a Kickstarter project, the Slovenia- and Kalamazoo, Michigan-based startup today has around 100,000 active Bird Buddy users who are using its original Smart Feeder<\/a> and AI-powered mobile app to engage with nature and learn more about their local bird populations. Of particular interest is the fact that roughly a third of those users are new to birdwatching, which demonstrates the draw this smart birdfeeder system has to pull newcomers into this hobby.<\/p>\n The original Bird Buddy feeder is $199 \u2014 or $269 with a solar roof to charge the camera \u2014 and began shipping to its backers last September. It comes in blue and yellow and is made with new and post-consumer BPA-free recycled plastics. The feeder also comes with a length of cord to hang the feeder from a tree or post, as well as a bottom mount that works with a pole, wall, or fence mount. Plus, owners can purchase optional accessories for the system, like the solar roof or a suet holder, for an additional price<\/a>.<\/p>\n At CES, the company first teased its next product: a Hummingbird Feeder<\/a> and showed off a prototype.<\/p>\n Now, that product is getting nearer manufacturing, as Bird Buddy is returning to Kickstarter<\/a> to launch a crowdfunding campaign in the hopes of meeting a target $100,000 raise. As a benefit, backers will receive 25% off and exclusive bundles. That means the hummingbird feeder will retail for $235 but will be offered to early backers at $174 (super early bird) and $189 (early bird). The Smart Bird Bath, meanwhile, will retail for $249 but will be offered at $184 or $199 to early Kickstarter backers.<\/p>\n Image Credits:<\/strong> Bird Buddy<\/p>\n<\/div>\n Like the original smart bird feeder, the new Bird Buddy Smart Hummingbird Feeder is designed to provide up-close views of its visitors while the Bird Buddy software has been updated to recognize all common hummingbird species across North America. The company notes the feeder may also attract bees and butterflies, increasing the biodiversity of its customers\u2019 backyards.<\/p>\n Also similar to the original feeder, the new Hummingbird Feeder can be bought with or without the solar roof and will use the same camera module with 5 megapixels and HD video, and a 120-degree field of view. Because the camera module is the same, existing customers will be able to swap their cameras between their different feeders.<\/p>\n Image Credits:<\/strong> Bird Buddy Hummingbird Feeder<\/p>\n<\/div>\n Meanwhile, the new Smart Bird Bath offers a way to attract more species of birds to the backyard \u2014 particularly in the summer months.<\/p>\n Though the company today generates its revenue by selling its bird feeders, the smart devices themselves are not the real star of the show for Bird Buddy \u2014 it\u2019s the app and the community Bird Buddy is building.<\/p>\n Image Credits:<\/strong> Bird Buddy Smart Feeder<\/p>\n<\/div>\n For over a month, I\u2019ve been trying Bird Buddy\u2019s smart feeder (provided to TechCrunch by the company), to learn more about the product. I found that even after the initial excitement wore off, scrolling through Bird Buddy\u2019s feed has become a regular part of my daily routine (as those who follow me on Bluesky<\/a> already know.<\/a>). And it\u2019s arguably a more relaxing and fulfilling experience than scrolling videos on TikTok or watching Instagram Stories, I should note.<\/p>\n Co-founder Ziga Vrtacic<\/a>, who originally hailed from mobile gaming company Outfit7 (Talking Tom kids app maker) told TechCrunch that the inspiration for the smart birdfeeder struck him after he came across that YouTube video of a seagull stealing a GoPro camera.<\/a> The video includes several up-close shots of the bird looking into the camera lens.<\/p>\n \u201cI realized that we never see birds from this personal perspective \u2014 they\u2019re always photographed from far away,\u201d Vrtacic says. \u201cSeeing birds from this angle really makes a ton of difference in the way you perceive it.\u201d<\/p>\n The founder teamed up with colleague and friend Franci Zidar, now Bird Buddy CEO, to develop the Bird Buddy system. The two realized they had no background in working with hardware, which led them to bring on Bird Buddy\u2019s third co-founder Kyle Buzzard, whose background included work on the first Chromecast design, various Logitech cameras, and the Nest Cam.<\/p>\n Image Credits:<\/strong> Bird Buddy<\/p>\n<\/div>\n Still, the founders knew that they had to offer more than just a birdfeeder with a camera attached \u2014 something Vrtacic dismisses today as \u201cnot much of an idea\u201d and \u201cvery obvious.\u201d Instead, the team decided to focus more heavily on the software side of its business, building out an AI-powered mobile app that is able to identify bird species and allows users to collect photos and videos as well as engage with a birdwatching community.<\/p>\n Fast forward to today and Bird Buddy is now capable of identifying 452 species using its own proprietary bird identification system \u2014 not a third-party integration. As the company expands into new markets around the world, it adds more birds to its model by identifying those that get sent into its \u201cexpert review\u201d system where it loops in ornithologists to make the determination.<\/p>\n As bird visitors drop by your feeder, the camera engages to take videos and photos which are then shared through the Bird Buddy app as updates. Though you can use the app to watch the camera feed live, this isn\u2019t core to the experience. Rather, you\u2019re meant to tap on push notifications sent to your phone to watch your bird visitors or review them later when you have downtime.<\/p>\n Image Credits:<\/strong> Bird Buddy<\/p>\n<\/div>\n Under the hood, Bird Buddy trained its photo and video-capturing system by labeling a couple of million photos to teach it what a \u201cgood\u201d bird photo would look like. For example, it learned that a good photo would have the bird clearly in the frame or you\u2019d be able to see the beak, for example \u2014 though the specific details regarding its training are part of Bird Buddy\u2019s secret sauce.<\/p>\n In the initial version of the app, which I tested, these photos and videos were sent through as cute \u201cpostcards\u201d you would tap to open. The design was adorable as each opening included a bit of fanfare \u2014 and when a new bird visited, there would be a bit of a celebration alongside your first look. You\u2019d then swipe left or right, Tinder-style, to save or discard photos and could opt to save or delete the photo or video entirely, if it wasn\u2019t one you wanted to keep or share.<\/p>\n You can then choose to save the media to your private collection in the app or share the photos and videos with the Bird Buddy community, which is also accessible through the app.<\/p>\n Over time, however, I found that ending up with a dozen or so postcards at the end of the day to go through \u2014 often only to see the same bird over and over again, which is common to the Bird Buddy user experience \u2014 began to lose its novelty. At first, I was thrilled to watch a mating set of cardinals (where the male fed the female some seeds \u2014 awww!<\/em>), But by the twentieth time I had a cardinal postcard to open, the experience of tapping to open, then manually selecting which photos and videos to save had become a little tedious.<\/p>\n Bird Buddy had heard this complaint, too, and quickly readjusted.<\/p>\n \u201cThat was the second most often reported feedback,\u201d Vrtacic admitted. (The first was battery life, but this was addressed with a late December\/early January update, leaving the postcard collection flow the number one issue. Now the battery makes it through a good part of a week for me, though this will vary based on your own \u201cbird traffic.\u201d)<\/p>\n The feedback led to the app\u2019s redesign, which recently rolled out.<\/p>\n Now, the user interface does away with the tap-to-open experience in favor of a stream of updates, similar to a notification or inbox feed. Here, you can preview each item and choose whether or not to view the content or just swipe it to dismiss it. In other words, you can skip watching the 13th visit from your cardinal friend by swiping it away and just tapping to see the other bird photos instead.<\/p>\n Once you\u2019re viewing the images,\u00a0 you\u2019ll still need to swipe to save or delete photos, as before. But the second part of the redesign, expected in a couple of months, will allow you to multi-select photos for faster processing \u2014 again speeding things up.<\/p>\n Image Credits:<\/strong> Bird Buddy<\/p>\n<\/div>\n After managing your notifications, you can also scroll through your past photos in a feed or tap over to other sections of the app.<\/p>\n Your private collection is available through the second tab from the left, letting you track and return to all the different types of birds you\u2019ve \u201ccollected.\u201d In this section, you can learn more about the species through informative blurbs and cards, play clips of the bird\u2019s call and songs, view a map of where they\u2019re found in the world, and share individual photos or videos with friends or on social media.<\/p>\n Image Credits:<\/strong> Bird Buddy<\/p>\n<\/div>\n This helps augment the app with educational content, which is particularly useful to newcomers to bird-watching.<\/p>\n Another new feature in the software update is a feed of \u201cmystery visitors\u201d \u2014 which is what Bird Buddy calls the birds its software, for whatever reason, can\u2019t identify \u2014 maybe they\u2019re out of frame, blurry, or there\u2019s a glare, or it just doesn\u2019t have them in its database yet. With this additional resource, bird experts can now help you to classify your unknown birds, at your request.<\/p>\n Image Credits:<\/strong> Bird Buddy<\/p>\n<\/div>\n However, the most enjoyable part of the app update has been the new Bird Buddy TV feature, which is an almost TikTok-like vertical feed of bird videos, recorded from customers\u2019 devices, which you swipe through vertically.<\/p>\n \u201cBird Buddy TV is our experiment in allowing people to consume this content without really any work,\u201d explains Vrtacic. \u201cAnd we\u2019re seeing great success with that feature, even though the first version is not even interactive yet. You cannot like share or comment,\u201d he notes. \u201cBut that is also something that\u2019s coming soon,\u201d he teases.<\/p>\n Customers are spending increased minutes in the app because of this addition, rivaling in some cases, the time spent on social media.<\/p>\n The company says it\u2019s careful to respect user privacy when sharing videos into this feed, making sure that it\u2019s not picking up any personal information \u2014 like house numbers, license plates on nearby parked cars, and, of course, humans. Over time this video feed could also bring in non-Bird Buddy product owners into the app to engage with the content and community, without having to invest in a feeder itself.<\/p>\n Another of Bird Buddy\u2019s bigger goals is to make its bird feeder data available to researchers. This is something it\u2019s already working on, as it now makes the data available to the public for download through its Bird Buddy Heartbeat website<\/a> in addition to a stream of live sightings. But conversations with universities, bird groups, and other researchers are still in the early stages about what sort of data they need and how Bird Buddy can better contribute.<\/p>\n Image Credits:<\/strong> Bird Buddy (live website)<\/p>\n<\/div>\n In the meantime, the company believes it has created value beyond its hardware-software combination by way of its community of bird watchers who chat, interact, and share tips and ideas with one another. That community today lives on Facebook, but could be migrated to live more fully inside the Bird Buddy app itself over time.<\/p>\n \u201cWe do think that our community is our greatest asset,\u201d notes Vrtacic. \u201cIt took us some time to be able to build a team that can really support this community, right because [there are] huge volumes of messages coming in and being posted to a lot of channels. We are now making this a priority\u2026we find it super important to invest in that relationship,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n To date, Bird Buddy has raised $8.5 million<\/a> in funding<\/a> led by General Catalyst and London-based VC firm BACKED. The startup has not decided if or when it will raise more funding, but says it could.<\/p>\n \u201cI must say that there\u2019s a lot of investor interest\u2026this is not one of our problems,\u201d Vrtacic says.<\/p>\n Bird Buddy\u2019s earlier Kickstarter was one of the platform\u2019s top 1% most-funded projects, as 22,925 users backed the project by raising nearly $4.6 million, making it one of the biggest projects of 2021. The Bird Buddy Kickstarter for new products<\/a> is live now. As of the time of writing, it\u2019s raised $912,045 of its $100,000 goal.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n <\/br><\/br><\/br><\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/techcrunch.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/05\/Birdbuddy_KS_campaign_2023_product_lifestyle_4.png?resize=680%2C383&ssl=1\")
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