They launched almost two years before tensorflow and google vision APIs were released. At the time there were only a few labs doing deep learning research so an

They launched almost two years before tensorflow and google vision APIs were released. At the time there were only a few labs doing deep learning research so an API seemed like the best way to make the technology accessible to more people. Publishing research papers is a great way to get acquired but it's not the best use of your time if you're a small startup that's trying to make money. They still do research but it makes it into the product instead of getting published.