Tuduu raises one million to bring small producers' ecommerce abroad
Funding round to develop the platform that targets traders and restaurateurs as well as end users, correlating products with recipes to make the best use of them
3' min read
3' min read
In its first month of launch, last May, it totalled 26,000 unique users, 30% of whom were foreigners. Merchants, small distributors, restaurateurs and end consumers tapped into the catalogues of small and medium-sized Italian companies operating in the field of food, wine and beer, and offering mainly pasta, sauces, olive oil, bakery products and niche labels.
"On our platform there are no big, well-known brands of made in Italy: not because we have any preclusions but because our mission is to give a concrete opportunity to small producers," says Giuseppe Virzì, founder of Tuduu, the marketplace set up to bring the great national food tradition to the world (only 12,000 companies now also use e-commerce), digitalising the catalogues, translating them into 17 languages (there are also Hindi and Korean) and encoding them with over two thousand recipes. A bet that convinced more than thirty entrepreneurs and business angels, thanks to whom the start-up closed an investment round of more than one million euro. The operation - the start-up company says - involves more than 30 business angels and entrepreneurs, including Giulio Xiloyannis, Luca Foresti, Rossella Brenna, Nabil De Marco and Francesco Pagano. The start-up company is also involved in the operation.
Resources that will be used for the technological development, through artificial intelligence, of a new customer service approach and an automated dubbing system for videos made by manufacturers. In the first case, the idea is to make it easier for consumers and buyers to select the products best suited to their needs, directing them towards more personalised purchases. In the second case, the idea is to translate and distribute the videos also on the main social networks and YouTube.
It all started in Milan with a mobile app and then continued, in 2024, with a global platform exploiting the potential of artificial intelligence. Today, the start-up is a real tech company that leverages three algorithms capable of analysing, translating and enriching manufacturers' (but also distributors') catalogues.
'The Italian food market, which is still poorly digitalised, still has enormous potential on the export front, we thought of an international showcase,' explains Virzì, who can count on the cooperation of 12 people. Now Tuduu exhibits the products of 25 companies, for a total of 50 thousand references, focusing on a food and wine niche. With 25 others it is concluding the agreement to debut on the platform. An agreement that includes an intermediation fee, with shipping remaining the responsibility of the producer.
