OREANDA-NEWS. NEC Corporation's "GAZIRU" image recognition technologies have been adopted by Hakuhodo Inc., one of Japan's leading advertising companies, for its "Kokoku +" advertising service, scheduled to launch on February 18.

The GAZIRU service displays detailed information on photos taken with the built-in cameras of smartphones by using NEC's independently developed, highly accurate image recognition engine to match new pictures with image data that was previously registered on the cloud or within a device.

Kokoku + is a new advertising service from Hakuhodo that drives customers to its clients' Web sites and stores by leveraging GAZIRU technologies to enable smartphones to recognize television commercials, product packaging and print-based media. Users simply download the Kokoku + application to their smartphone, then gain access to product information, sales campaign information and coupons by taking photos of television commercials, newspaper/magazine advertisements, signs and posters that support the service.

Going forward, NEC will continue to promote GAZIRU as a base for innovative new advertising services. Moreover, NEC aims to apply these technologies beyond the advertising field, in order to create new value-added solutions and services that capitalize on image data, big data and contribute to a wide range of industries.

NEC will showcase the GAZIRU image recognition service and Hakuhodo's Kokoku + in Hall 3, Stand 3B4 at Mobile World Congress 2013 in Barcelona, Spain, from February 25 - 28, 2013.