Almond&Co, a beauty-tech Start - Up that fuses AI and design technology, is pioneering the market for "medical-grade, personalized home beauty care." Founded in Mar. 2021 by CEO Seo Min-jae, born in 1993, the company is developing a device that lets anyone receive dermatology-level care at home, centered on AI-based real-time skin diagnosis technology.
While working at a medical device company, Seo saw that "personalization" would soon be the key differentiator in the fast-growing beauty device market. Seo said, "Existing beauty devices focused on functions, but I thought combining diagnostic AI would make professional, personalized care possible at home," and noted, "We founded the company with a physician, engineers from LG Electronics, AI experts, and medical device design engineers."
Almond&Co's strength is its "AI Ondevice" technology. Without cloud consolidation, the device itself can analyze and diagnose skin conditions in real time. It precisely measures sebum level, moisture level, elasticity, and thickness to automatically present a solution optimized to an individual's skin characteristics.
Seo explained, "AI recognizes different skin conditions by area and automatically controls the strength and speed to suit each area," adding, "You can manage acne, sebum levels, and elasticity differently by area, such as the forehead and chin."
The core product, the "Ionic Cryo Stick," is a home beauty device that combines a cooling effect with ion penetration technology. It immediately lowers skin temperature to reduce swelling and heat, providing calming and elasticity-improving effects. It automatically adjusts intensity based on skin measurement data, and, priced in the mid-100,000 won range, offers better accessibility than competitors in the 300,000–500,000 won range. Since first shipment in Dec. 2023, demand has been growing rapidly, centered on women in their 40s and 50s.
Seo said, "As data on skin health accumulates, the level of personalization for each individual is steadily increasing," adding, "Our goal is to enable hospital-grade care at home."
It is also expanding overseas to the United States and Japan. Japan's beauty device market is more than twice the size of Korea's, and the U.S. market is more than 10 times larger. Seo said, "If people in Korea once preferred J-beauty, now K-beauty is popular in Japan," adding, "We are targeting the Japanese and U.S. markets based on the competitiveness of our personalized diagnostic beauty devices."
Almond&Co is also preparing to expand into the medical device market. Within this year, it will launch the needle-free injector "ATShot." It is a high-priced (in the 1 million won range) product that can precisely control injections of Botox and skin boosters, and tailored supply is underway through hospitals and medical device companies. The company is also pursuing a plan to introduce home-use devices into hospital customer services in collaboration with hospitals.
It will also launch a beauty platform. Through the app, consumers will analyze beauty-health data to recommend cosmetics and provide various solutions related to the company's products such as medical devices. It is currently in testing and is scheduled for release early next year. Seo said, "We will grow beyond simple beauty devices into a global, comprehensive beauty-health platform."