The $8.5 million fundraise at LIV allows the VR streaming company to bring on board top-tier investors and strategic partners that will help it get closer to its goal of existing on every headset and game
Quick read
➨ VR streaming provider LIV has raised $8.5 million of series A funding grow the creator and developer ecosystem
➨ LIV plans to invest in a VR and AR creator and developer fund and add to its own team
➨ The new funding comes on the back of LIV’s success so far and its plans for the future, as the company launches an “all-software based volumetric streaming technology and destination platform”
The story
Hot on the heels of LIV’s partnership with Tobii and Ready Player Me, the virtual reality (VR) streaming company has raised $8.5 million of series A funding to grow the creator and developer ecosystem.
LIV plans to invest in a VR and augmented reality (AR) creator and developer fund and add to its own team, with the company actively hiring across engineering, design, operations, marketing and community management.
The LIV streaming platform enables creators to share their experiences inside VR and AR games with their fans in real-time, as either themselves using mixed reality capture or as their avatars.
LIV has enjoyed particular success in VR gaming as the sector takes off amid high hardware sales last year. It claims to support more than half of the top 100 VR games with over 2,200 developers on its platform.
Developers integrate the LIV software development kit with their own games and apps to unlock a suite of capture tools and technologies for their users, generating video content that serves to market their products.
LIV also claims that there are 13,000 monthly active creators on its platform, generating more than 30,000 hours of content every month.
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Creators are attracted to the VR streaming platform’s ease of use and need for little post-production. They are able to either film their real bodies inside a VR game or transform themselves into a custom avatar that supports full-body tracking, finger tracking, eye animation, and lip tracking.
It also provides a full-suite utility stack for seeing stream chat, alerts and notifications in-headset.
The new funding comes on the back of LIV’s success so far and its plans for the future, with investment earmarked for a creator and developer fund as the VR streaming company launches an “all-software based volumetric streaming technology and destination platform”.
This will enable “entire worlds and the people that inhabit it” to be captured for playback or live consumption, “opening up an entirely new category of social experiences between fans, creators and gamers”.
” data-image-caption=”
AJ ‘Dr Doom’ Shewki
” data-medium-file=”https://i0.wp.com/vrworldtech.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/LIV-raises-8.5m-AJ-Shewki.png?fit=300%2C169&ssl=1″ data-large-file=”https://i0.wp.com/vrworldtech.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/LIV-raises-8.5m-AJ-Shewki.png?fit=600%2C338&ssl=1″ loading=”lazy” width=”600″ height=”338″ src=”https://i0.wp.com/vrworldtech.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/LIV-raises-8.5m-AJ-Shewki.png?resize=600%2C338&ssl=1″ alt=”LIV raises $8.5m – AJ Shewki” class=”wp-image-12215″ srcset=”https://i0.wp.com/vrworldtech.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/LIV-raises-8.5m-AJ-Shewki.png?resize=1024%2C576&ssl=1 1024w, https://i0.wp.com/vrworldtech.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/LIV-raises-8.5m-AJ-Shewki.png?resize=300%2C169&ssl=1 300w, https://i0.wp.com/vrworldtech.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/LIV-raises-8.5m-AJ-Shewki.png?resize=768%2C432&ssl=1 768w, https://i0.wp.com/vrworldtech.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/LIV-raises-8.5m-AJ-Shewki.png?resize=1536%2C864&ssl=1 1536w, https://i0.wp.com/vrworldtech.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/LIV-raises-8.5m-AJ-Shewki.png?resize=1320%2C743&ssl=1 1320w, https://i0.wp.com/vrworldtech.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/LIV-raises-8.5m-AJ-Shewki.png?w=1600&ssl=1 1600w, https://i0.wp.com/vrworldtech.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/LIV-raises-8.5m-AJ-Shewki.png?w=1200&ssl=1 1200w” sizes=”(max-width: 600px) 100vw, 600px” data-recalc-dims=”1″>
AJ ‘Dr Doom’ Shewki, chief executive officer and co-founder of LIV, commented: “This raise allows us to bring on board top-tier investors and strategic partners that will help us get closer to our goal of LIV existing on every headset and game.”
BITKRAFT Ventures led the $8.5 million series A funding round, with participation from Sony Innovation Fund, Amazon Alexa Fund, Credo Ventures, Samsung Next, Olive Tree Capital and angel investors.
Jens Hilgers, founding general partner at BITKRAFT Ventures, will also join the LIV board. He said: “We believe VR and AR will bring forward a distinct new platform for content creation, and the VR natives behind LIV are leading the way.”
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Images: LIV
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