British virtual reality (VR) developer Cooperative Innovations – the team behind Raiders of Erda – has announced the closure of a seed funding round, securing the company £500K of investment. Alongside, the funding, the studio has released a proprietary VR animation technology, Ikabod.
The investment came from a number of sources, including angel investor Craig Fletcher, Ascension Ventures and Trend Investment Group. The company plans on expanding its employee cap whilst launching a pilot licensing programme for Ikabod. The cash will also be used to continue Cooperative Innovations’ ongoing research and development into immersive technologies, as well as its MMORPG VR experience, Raiders of Erda, plus an unannounced multiplayer VR/AR title.
“Securing this investment really allows us to scale-up the studio and continue to build on our core technologies and tools,” said CEO and co-founder Simon Barratt in a statement. “We’re passionate about immersive experiences as the future of work, life and play, and we’re excited about the opportunity to grow the team, continue our R&D, and release some of our original IP too!”
Ikabod is Cooperative Innovations’ proprietary animation technology with a wide range of use cases. Its primary role is to help developers reflect a player’s real-world physicality on to a VR avatar, so players can see their arm and body movements properly mirrored in VR.
“Ikabod came about as we needed a full IK solution that was fast enough to use on every character, while embracing easy-of-use and artistic expression. Nothing available did everything we needed, so we made it ourselves. We can’t wait to get Ikabod into the hands of more developers and creatives. Being able to now launch this pilot licensing programme, we’re able to really push the system in-the-wild, and continue to improve it into the future. We look forward to hearing from any developers interested in a demo,” CTO and co-founder Brian Marshall adds.
Cooperative Innovations is now actively seeking selected licensing partners for Ikabod. As the company continues to grow and reveal more info on its upcoming VR titles like Raiders of Erda VRFocus will let you know.