SCENTMATIC’s AI scent-language system KAORIUM makes UK debut at Selfridges with THAMEEN Fragrance event

SCENTMATIC Inc., the Japanese innovator in olfactory technology, officially debuted its flagship AI platform KAORIUM at the June 2025 launch of “Florentine Diamond” by UK-based luxury fragrance house THAMEEN Fragrance. The high-profile experiential showcase ran from June 5 to June 11, 2025, inside the Selfridges department store in London, offering a first-of-its-kind sensory-linguistic interface to fragrance buyers and professionals in Europe’s most mature scent market.

This marked the first live international deployment of KAORIUM since the launch of SCENTMATIC’s dedicated UK subsidiary earlier in 2025. As European fragrance sales are projected to reach over US$2.82 billion in the UK alone by 2033, institutional sentiment around scent-tech innovation is increasingly focused on experiential commerce, sensorial AI, and consumer-personalized purchasing.

How is SCENTMATIC using AI to personalize the luxury fragrance shopping experience in the UK?

SCENTMATIC’s KAORIUM system is a proprietary artificial intelligence platform designed to bridge olfaction and language. Positioned as a scent-to-language interface, KAORIUM interprets a user’s sensory reaction to fragrance in real time and provides semantic feedback, allowing for personalized scent exploration. In a market defined by emotional resonance and subjective taste, the ability to codify scent in language enables an entirely new retail layer—driven by data, neuro-sensory mapping, and multilingual sensory recall.

At the Selfridges launch, THAMEEN Fragrance and SCENTMATIC curated immersive sessions using KAORIUM where customers and influencers could verbally interact with scent profiles and receive AI-generated visualizations of their fragrance impressions. This format aims to reduce the ambiguity of perfume shopping while supporting fragrance brand storytelling through emotionally resonant cues.

The activation was also accompanied by a private industry breakfast hosted at Selfridges’ “Brasserie of Light,” attracting fragrance influencers, retail strategists, and AI integration specialists. The KAORIUM interface was demonstrated in one-on-one use cases during the event’s opening day, marking its operational debut in a Western retail environment.

Why did SCENTMATIC choose London’s Selfridges and THAMEEN Fragrance for KAORIUM’s first global deployment?

The decision to launch KAORIUM in partnership with THAMEEN Fragrance and Selfridges reflects a strategic move by SCENTMATIC to align with two powerful entities in luxury commerce and niche perfumery. Selfridges is a heritage department store known for its early adoption of experiential technologies in beauty and lifestyle, while THAMEEN represents a prestige fragrance brand known for rare gem-inspired compositions and refined Extrait de Parfum products.

THAMEEN, translating to “precious” in Arabic, curates a portfolio of long-lasting, high-intensity fragrances with a loyal following in global niche perfume communities. The Florentine Diamond, inspired by one of history’s most storied gemstones, served as an ideal canvas for a multi-sensory launch combining story, scent, and semantic mapping through KAORIUM.

According to insiders familiar with the event strategy, Selfridges’ premium positioning and THAMEEN’s commitment to sensory heritage made this collaboration ideal for testing AI integration in a high-stakes luxury retail environment.

What is KAORIUM and how does it translate fragrance into human language and emotional cognition?

KAORIUM functions as an AI system that mutually translates between scent stimuli and linguistic representation. By capturing user input through verbal cues and pairing those with digital olfactory databases, it generates both word clouds and emotional sentiment layers tied to a specific fragrance profile. The system activates bilateral brain regions, connecting sensory perception with language centers, which SCENTMATIC refers to as “unlocking dormant sensitivities.”

Beyond fragrance retail, KAORIUM is positioned as a scalable tool for industries ranging from culinary exploration and education to mental wellness and sensorial rehabilitation. SCENTMATIC anticipates applications in cross-modal communication and emotional UX design, particularly in regions like Europe where perfume, dining, and language intersect as premium lifestyle markets.

What does SCENTMATIC’s global expansion into the UK signal for the future of scent-digitalization and AI sensory commerce?

In May 2024, SCENTMATIC formally established its international expansion roadmap with the launch of KAORIUM Ltd. in London. This UK-based entity is now led by Ben Yanoushek, an executive with deep cross-border retail and AI product expertise. The operational launch occurred on February 1, 2025, alongside the launch of KAORIUM’s UK digital platform at www.kaorium.com.

This global expansion aligns with market research projecting the UK fragrance market to grow from its current ~$2 billion valuation to approximately US$2.82 billion by 2033. Analysts believe AI-driven personalization could serve as a differentiating layer in an otherwise saturated perfume market. Institutional stakeholders have shown increasing appetite for AI-enabled customer journeys in luxury retail, with KAORIUM viewed as a potential category disruptor.

By offering real-time olfactory feedback and enhancing emotional resonance during the purchasing process, SCENTMATIC’s system may alter how consumers interact with abstract sensory categories—particularly in e-commerce and remote retail environments.

How do institutional stakeholders view KAORIUM’s potential for scale across fragrance, dining, and lifestyle sectors?

Though not publicly listed, SCENTMATIC’s platform is drawing increasing attention from retail strategists, luxury consultants, and innovation-forward investment groups. The use of cross-modal AI to decode human perception is widely viewed as a frontier category, especially when paired with heritage sensory industries like perfumery or cuisine.

In fragrance, KAORIUM’s potential to reduce purchase uncertainty and accelerate brand storytelling could improve conversion rates in both physical and online retail formats. In dining and hospitality, the ability to associate flavor or aroma with linguistic memory could be applied in wine, spirits, and fine dining education.

Educational and therapeutic sectors may also benefit from KAORIUM’s interface, particularly in cognitive development, language recovery, or sensory therapy. As AI personalization continues to redefine user experience benchmarks, tools like KAORIUM may become key enablers in bridging subjective human response with quantifiable engagement data.

What future initiatives and cross-sector partnerships could emerge from SCENTMATIC’s AI scent-language platform?

Looking ahead, analysts anticipate that SCENTMATIC will deepen its presence in Europe and Asia through additional product trials, co-branded activations, and white-label licensing for other fragrance houses and lifestyle brands. Interest is reportedly strong from luxury department stores in France, Germany, and Japan—markets known for their premium scent traditions and innovation readiness.

KAORIUM may also be extended into digital sampling, e-commerce augmentation, and mobile-based sensory interaction. SCENTMATIC’s broader ambition to “digitalize olfaction” opens avenues into virtual and augmented reality, emotion analytics, and AI-generated mood curation. These use cases could position the Tokyo-based firm as a cross-disciplinary leader in future-of-senses tech.

Institutional sentiment remains cautiously optimistic as the firm enters its sixth year of operations. While monetization models are still evolving, early use cases suggest promising traction, especially in premium verticals where customer experience is paramount.