Twenty-seven venture capital funds and investors are uniting to hold the Global AR Online Pitch Event, a contest aimed at identifying stellar augmented reality startups. The winning contestant will likely receive an investment from the group.
Gree’s investment fund, dubbed the GFR Fund, organized the event with Super Ventures and the Venture Reality Fund. The deadline for contest entries is April 23, and contestants will submit their entries online to an audience of accredited global AR investors (listed below).
Eight startups will be selected as finalists to present at the online pitch event, which will take place live before investors. Finalists will have five minutes to pitch, followed by two minutes of questions from a selected panel of investors. The finalists will also deliver live pitches at the Augmented World Expo event on May 31. Startups from around the globe are eligible to apply.
“We’ll be able to look at companies from all over,” said Teppei Tsutsui, CEO and managing director of the GFR Fund, an affiliate of Japan’s Gree Capital, which is affiliated with mobile game company Gree.
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Startups need to be in the pre-seed, seed, or Series A investment stages, and they have to be working on an AR product and have a minimum viable product, Tsutsui said in an interview with GamesBeat.
The exact amount of the investment for the winner isn’t known yet, but each investor will contribute an amount. As far as the AR market goes, Tsutsui said, “We see it as early. We are excited about this event and giving startups the opportunity to present to investors.”
With the launch of foundational AR technologies such as ARKit and ARCore, Tsutsui said he believes the contest is well-timed for the dawn of AR.
- GFR Fund
- Super Ventures
- The Venture Reality Fund
- Advancit Capital
- Akatsuki
- Anorak Ventures
- Betaworks
- Candela Partners
- Colopl Next
- CRCM
- Crosscut
- Eniac Ventures
- GC Tracker
- Gumi
- iMercury Capital
- Index Ventures
- Loup Ventures
- Outpost Capital
- Pathbreaker Ventures
- Qualcomm Ventures
- Rothenberg Ventures
- Samsung Next
- Shasta Ventures
- Toyota AI Ventures
- Upfront Ventures
- WXR Venture Fund
- 645 Ventures
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