Halo Raises $7M Seed for Robotic Hair Braiding Assistant

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Halo, a hair technology company based in Los Angeles, California, has raised a $7 million Seed round led by Alexis Ohanian’s firm 776, with participation from Bling Capital and AlleyCorp.

The company’s first product, HaloBraid, is an automated braiding assistant designed to work alongside stylists rather than replace them. Each braid is started by hand by the stylist, and HaloBraid then finishes it, matching the stylist’s work but completing it about five times faster.

Founder Yinka Ogunbiyi, a Harvard bioengineering graduate, built the system as infrastructure for an industry that has long been overlooked. The time commitment is a big part of the problem the company is addressing. Getting hair braided can take roughly six hours, and people often repeat the process every six to eight weeks. In a survey Halo conducted, 95 percent of braid wearers said they would choose braided styles more often if the process took less time.

HaloBraid will go live in salons in the fall. The company says 6,000 stylists have signed up to receive the device, with another 5,000 stylists and salons on the waitlist, spread across major cities including Los Angeles, Chicago, and New York.