- Brno-based Buylo raised EUR 640K from Purple Ventures to scale its RFID-powered retail automation
- Founded in 2024, the startup combines retail, software, and industrial expertise
- Its tech enables 10-second self-checkouts, accurate inventory, and ethical, anonymized data use
- With the new funding, Buylo expands across Europe and the US, with the goal of building a full smart chain ecosystem
This August, the proactive Czech VC fund Purple Ventures (invested in Sloneek, among others) became the lead and sole investor in Buylo’s Pre-Seed Round of EUR 640K. This is a Czech retail automation startup that provides RFID-powered self-checkout technology enabling shoppers to scan and pay for all their items in about 10 seconds, eliminating queues and streamlining in-store operations for retailers.
A Moment of Frustration That Sparked Innovation
Jozef Voda, Co-Founder and CEO at Buylo
‘The concept of Buylo was born from a simple experience — standing in a crowded self-checkout line, observing the ensuing chaos. I saw what slows down the entire retail chain: wasted time, disconnected systems, and data that never match reality. While many accepted this as the norm, I disagreed. I believed RFID and AI could bring real-time precision and control to the physical world — the same clarity we take for granted in digital systems,’ Buylo’s CEO Jozef Voda recalls.
Building a background in retail and e-commerce, Mr Voda began with founding a fashion brand called Labatti at the age of 17, teaching himself about the critical importance of stock precision and customer trust. His next venture was Industrial IT, a software company focused on digitizing manufacturing and logistics. Additionally, he managed and successfully sold Maestro Barber, a brick-and-mortar business.
‘Throughout these ventures, one constant challenge remained — fragmented data. Buylo originated from this frustration,’ the entrepreneur shares.
Petr Růžička (CBDO) built a 150-person engineering company from scratch and knows how to scale operations, production, and logistics efficiently.Enlisting his expertise, Mr Voda added the former’s deep experience in industrial automation and business development to the latter’s background in retail systems, data-driven software, the digital layer, and user-facing vision.
‘Buylo co-founders’ combined competencies in both software and hardware sides of tech are impressive. Their product and service work excellently and have huge potential both in Europe and in the US, and the highly motivated founders already work on international business development,’ Purple Ventures’ general partner Jan Stanek comments.
From Pilot to Spin-Off: Building the Smart Chain Infrastructure
Jan Staněk, General Partner at Purple Ventures
The two founded Buylo in October 2024, driven by the shared goal to develop an invisible infrastructure that would make the flow of goods as smart and reliable as the flow of data, seamlessly integrating production, logistics, warehousing, and checkout into a unified, frictionless smart chain.
Beginning as an ‘idea in motion,’ Buylo initially got tested inside Industrial IT. The official founding is dated October 2024, when Buylo spun off as a stand-alone project with the first pilot launched with Chicdeal.
Retail Automation Balancing Efficiency and the Human Touch
In essence, Buylo’s RFID-based retail automation solutions allow shoppers to scan their items quickly and pay in approximately 10 seconds. This technology eliminates queues and simplifies the checkout process, improving both customer experience and operational efficiency for retailers. In addition, Buylo provides analytics and inventory management tools, helping stores optimize stock levels, reduce losses, and enhance overall store performance.
The demand for fast and more convenient self-checkout options raises the question of balancing the push for hyper-efficiency with preserving human connection and the shopper experience in-store. A ‘moment’ in a physical retail environment needs to be detected, that technology enhances rather than replaces.
The Buylo team firmly believes that efficiency isn’t about removing people — it’s about removing friction. Technology should make human interactions smoother, not obsolete. With RFID and AI, store teams can focus on service instead of hunting for stock while customers enjoy a seamless experience: accurate availability, no queues, friction-free checkout. Smart chain retail with data and people working in harmony preserves the human touch and gets rid of the frustration.
Ethical Data, Anonymity, and Shopper Trust
This technology provides a capability to offer shoppers personalized discounts and other offers. Here, Mr Voda assures that Buylo does not track faces or individuals and sticks to products and events. With no facial recognition and all data being event-based and anonymized, processing happens locally. Based on that, retailers can offer basket-level relevance without sacrificing anonymity.
‘We have GDPR-compliant controls for consent and data retentionBuylo’s philosophy on this topic is clear: intelligence without surveillance,’ Buylo’s CEO emphasizes.
Buylo’s solution also promises to reduce theft losses by up to 80% via AI camera integration, which may imply certain ethical and operational risks, such as false positives, bias, privacy concerns.
Seeing how technology is prone to getting misused, Mr Voda’s team designed Buylo to be auditable and ethical from day one and built around 4 pillars:
- Human-in-the-loop: AI flags anomalies, but humans decide on actions.
- Bias testing: regular audits to ensure accuracy and fairness.
- Privacy: no face storage, no profiling, no ‘auto-accuse.’
- Governance: clear ethical use policies and model cards for all partners.
The goal is not control, but clarity. Buylo reduces loss by transparency – not by surveillance.
Setting the Stage for Global Growth
Recent implementations of Buylo’s RFID system included Yoyoso SK (store) and Numero Uno (warehouse) during August 2025, alongside the start of their US expansion through participation in the CBIA incubator in Atlanta.
‘Now we have active sales in the US, and are setting up a US entity including the investor visa process. During the last quarter of 2025, we are preparing a new HQ, a retail showroom in Prague, and a logistics demo hub in Třebíč, the Czech Republic,’ Mr Voda tells ITKeyMedia.
The new funding from Purple Ventures is meant to help Buylo develop its RFID self-checkout and AI inventory systems further, expand into CEE markets, and hire technical and sales staff to support growth. Buylo shares the specific roadmap:
- deploy Starter Kits in CEE markets, certify RFID hardware, and hire local solution Teams – all in Q4 2025 – Q1 2026,
- launch RFID self-checkout v2 and AI-driven inventory forecasting through Q2 – Q3 2026,
- and expand through integration partners and logistics alliances across Europe and the US in 2027.
Redefining Data Culture in Smart Retail
Jakub Nytra, Founder at Purple Ventures
‘RFID was our first step. Now we’re building the entire smart chain ecosystem which is the invisible infrastructure behind modern retail. Our goal is clear: to make the physical world as measurable and efficient as the digital one, and we believe the Czech Republic can lead this revolution, with the logistics, engineering talent, and technology in place,’ Mr Voda concludes.
‘Retail is a sector with a huge volume of money, but data culture has been slow to take hold. Buylo offers a solution that not only reduces costs and increases sales, but more importantly, gives retailers control. And since it’s being developed in the Czech Republic by a smart and driven team, the investment was a clear choice for us,’ Purple Ventures’ founder Jakub Nytra adds.
Buylo’s work highlights a pivotal shift in retail. It presents a picture where automation and ethics coexist to make stores more efficient, transparent, and human-centered at the same time. By turning real-time data into actionable insight without compromising privacy, the solution bridges the gap between digital precision and physical experience. In doing so, Buylo is not just redefining checkout — it’s redefining how technology and people collaborate across the entire retail chain.
Kostiantyn is a freelance writer from Crimea but based in Lviv. He loves writing about IT and high tech because those topics are always upbeat and he’s an inherent optimist!
