Viewpoints: September 2023 wrap-up

Welcome to this month’s curated digest of viewpoints, news and investment activity covering the Metaverse, XR and Spatial Computing - brought to you by FOV Ventures.

As a quick aside, we’re also hosting an Investor Roundtable tomorrow - be sure to sign up before it’s too late! We are also covering:

• FOV Ventures updates

• Portfolio news

• Portfolio companies that are hiring

• Funding and acquisitions

• Data points

We’ve got a lot to cover today, so let’s jump right in.

Dave Haynes, Petri Rajahalme and Sointu Karjalainen (FOV Ventures)

FOV Ventures updates

We have a whole bunch of updates for you this month, including:

• Our Investor Roundtable tomorrow;

• Our presence in AWE EU and Slush;

• And a Slush party just for friends of FOV Ventures!

Let’s go over each one.

1) Join our Investor Roundtable

Tune in this Wednesday 4th October at 10am PST / 6pm BST for the investor's perspective on last week's Meta Connect event. Our own Dave Haynes will be in conversation with Denise Xifara (Mercuri), Arian Ghashghai (Earthling.vc), Tipatat Chennavasin (The Venture Reality Fund) and Amal Dorai (Anorak Ventures) getting their perspectives on topics ranging from the mixed reality to Meta’s new AI initiative. We hope to see you there!

2) Meet us in Vienna for AWE Europe

We’ll also be in Vienna this month for AWE EU. Dave and Petri will be on the investor panel and helping judge the startup track, so come and say hi. If you haven’t booked your tickets already then just use the code SPKR23D to get 20% off your conference ticket.

3) Meet us in Helsinki for Slush

Also, as the excitement for Slush builds up to November, we're hosting an exclusive invite-only "Minus One" evening for the FOV Ventures portfolio, partners, co-investors, and our extended family. If you’re reading this, then you’re invited! But please don’t share beyond us 🤫

Just get ready to break the ice, share laughs, and forge warm connections. It's all happening at the Allas Sea Pool, one of our favourite Helsinki hangouts on November 28th, the evening before Slush officially kicks off.

Portfolio news

We're super excited to have backed GEEIQ earlier this year and see them now go on to complete their $8.2m Series A. For many brands, the Metaverse is the next frontier to engage an entire generation of users. Cutting through the hype requires data and insights. The GEEIQ intelligence platform provides this and more! Read more about the announcement here.

In other news:

• Move AI launched their ‘Move One’ mobile app that captures high-quality human motion in 3D. Check it out.

• Virtex talked to Esports Insider about the power of virtual stadiums

• GEEIQ Co-Founder and CEO, Charles Hambro, has been named a 'Tech and Web3 Innovator' on this year's The Vogue Business 100 Innovators.

• Friends of FOV, Anything.World launched their new ‘Animate Anything’ tool that auto-rigs any 3D object you upload.

Portfolio companies that are hiring

• GEEIQ is hiring a Senior Marketing Executive and a HR Manager.

• RLTY is hiring for several positions, from sales to social media to Unity 3D.

• Move.ai is hiring a Head of Finance.

• Makea Games is looking for a Senior Engineer among others.

• Virtex is hiring for several roles across the business.

Funding and acquisitions

Various platforms saw attention in September. Transfr, a VR skills version, raised $40m. Virtualitics, a data analytics platform with VR functionalities, raised $37m. On acquisitions, Xsolla acquired AcceleratXR, a game-based platform that can work in VR. And not wanting to be left behind, the VR Owl Group acquired MeetinVR, an immersive collaboration platform.

More technical companies received investments, too. Neuranics, a bio-magnetic sensor startup, raised $2.3m in funding; while Measurlabs raised €2.5m to help immersive companies ship faster. On AI, Aug X raised $3.1m to accelerate video production, while Luda raised $7m for AI training simulations.

It was also a good month if you were a fan of sports. The city of Sunderland raised £5.7m to boost its events, including the use of AR. And Takes, a sports app with immersive functionalities, raised $1.6m. Go team!

Data points

• 92% The number of US manufacturing execs that are investigating metaverse use cases according to Deloitte.

• 30m: The number of VR headsets that will be sold annually by 2027, according to IDC.

• $4.6bn: The market for immersive tech displays by 2034, according to IDTechEx.

And that’s everything! We hope to see you at the roundtable tomorrow, Slush or AWE EU. Until next time!

Dave Haynes, Petri Rajahalme and Sointu Karjalainen (FOV Ventures)

http://fov.ventures