Apprentice.io Secures Multi-Million Dollar Series A Funding

New Jersey augmented reality (AR) firm Apprentice.io is the latest immersive technology company to announce the results of a funding round, this time Series A, led by Pritzker Group Venture Capital and which also saw investment from Silverton Partners and Hemi Ventures as well as another name common to these types of stories The Venture Reality Fund.

The funding round saw the firm, secure an additional $8 million (USD) in funding. Bringing the total raised by the company so far to over $10 million.

Apprentice.io has developed Apprentice – an AR and artificial intelligence (AI) platform for batch records, tech transfer and R&D workflows as well as training procedures, with particular use to the pharmaceutical and biotech industries. Apprentice offers support ARKit 2 on iPhone XS as well as ARCore for Android devices, plus already has support for HoloLens, Magic Leap and other AR focused smart glasses. Subsequent growth has seen the start-up triple in size.

“We like to say that we don’t just augment reality; we augment human ability,” said Angelo Stracquatanio, the co-founder and CEO of Apprentice.io in a statement on the investment. “AR and AI are changing the way workforces across all industries solve problems and share information, ushering in the next wave of human potential.”

Vice President of the Pritzker Group Venture Capital added on his firm’s financial involvement: “We are absolutely thrilled to be collaborating with the leader in AR and AI. Angelo and his team of experts have a clear vision for what will be the next generation of enterprise AR. It was among the many reasons we were eager to invest at this stage.”

VRFocus will have more news about investment in the AR industry very soon.

Verizon Launches AR Music Contest to Win New iPhone XS

Earlier this week Apple revealed its newest iPhone models at a special event in Cupertino, with three new iteration of the iPhone X being displayed – the iPhone XS, the iPhone XS Max and the iPhone XR. Communications company Verizon are now giving consumers the chance to win a brand new iPhone XS by taking part in an augmented reality (AR) music experience.

The contest is set to run from 14th-17th September, and players will be able to use Snapchat to find and collect virtual music loops by using AR, in a similar way to how Pokemon are found in Pokemon Go.

Users will need to collect three music loops along with one super-loop. These need to then be arranged into a final mix and given a name. This mix can then be entered into the contest for a chance to win an iPhone XS.

Users will need to start be accessing and opening the game in Snapchat. From there, players will need to explore in order to locate the music loops. Each music loop has an interactive visualisation of the music genre is represents. Players need to catch 3 music loops and one super-loop in order to form a unique music mix.

The music loops were produced by production company Squeak E Clean, using songs by SZA, Borns and many more.

The new iPhone models are powered by the A12 Bionic chip, which features a combination 4-core powered GPU and 6-core powered CPU along with a Neural Engine comprised of 8 cores. Apple says the A12 Bionic is capable of up to 5 trillion operations per second and allows for calibration of cameras for AR with accurate motion tracking.

Apple also showed off the enhanced AR capabilites made possible by the ARKit 2, the next step for Apple’s AR toolsets which allows for deeper and more detailed AR experiences. Further information on the Verizon contest can be found on the official website.

For future coverage on Apple’s AR projects along with news on offers and giveaways, keep checking back with VRFocus.