Abstract: Techniques for spatially preserving flattening in deep learning neural networks are provided. In one aspect, a spatially preserving flattening module includes: a predictor for generating image feature maps from at least one convolutional layer of a feature extraction phase of a deep learning neural network applied to input image data; an auto-encoder for producing encodings of the image feature maps that preserve location and shape information associated with objects in the input image data; and a flattener for concatenating the encodings of the image feature maps to form a spatially preserving flattened encoding vector. A deep learning neural network that includes the present spatially preserving flattening module is also provided, as is a method for spatially preserving flattening.