SAN FRANCISCO--(BUSINESS WIRE)--FOVE, Inc. (FOVE), the world’s first eye-tracking Virtual Reality headset company, today announced that it has raised US$11 million in a Series A funding led by Colopl VR Fund with the participation of Hon Hai venture capital fund, 2020, and Samsung Venture Investment.
The FOVE head-mounted display (HMD), which features the world’s first eye-tracking technology, orientation sensing, and head position tracking, enables users to experience high precision control and a more immersive and natural interaction with the virtual characters.
The additional funding will enhance FOVE’s strategic collaboration with Investment Companies and support its goal of accelerating mass production of the device in the Fall of 2016. It will also strengthen the company’s mid- to long-term R&D capabilities and reinforce business support in VR content creation featuring eye-tracking technology.
Investors in the Series A round include:
- The Colopl VR Fund - totaling $50M - was established by COLOPL Inc. and COLOPL NEXT, Inc. (COLOPL, Inc.’s 100% investment business subsidiary), focusing specifically on VR. As recently announced, the FOVE platform will be operating in over 7,500 Internet cafes in Korea and Japan, expanding the VR experience to more users than ever before. In addition, the companies will invest in products that are compatible with FOVE HMDs, such as eye-tracking VR experiences developed by COLOPL, Inc.
- The support of 2020, a Hon Hai venture capital focused on novel technology, which will facilitate plans for the mass production of FOVE products in the new product category of VR HMDs.
“Taking the VR experience one step further, we are thrilled to have the support of COLOPL, Hon Hai and Samsung. This will help us achieve our goal of creating a more pleasing VR experience that will have a lasting impact on the growing number of users interested in eye-tracking technology.” says Yuka Kojima, FOVE, Inc.’s CEO and co-founder.
What is FOVE?
FOVE is a cutting-edge VR headset, the first in the world to have integrated eye-tracking, in addition to head- and position-tracking. The user’s gaze allows FOVE to offer:
- Pleasant and long VR experiences with minimal simulation sickness
- A more natural image by blurring unfocused peripheral areas
- Lifelike communication through eye-contact with other VR players
- Entirely new, subconscious UI operations using eyesight
- Foveated rendering; a technique that reduces the GPU burden in areas where the user is not looking
The VR industry still has many issues to resolve, but FOVE’s improvements on past VR products provides a stepping stone for future VR experiences.
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High resolution pictures and logos can be found here. Please see FOVE’s Facebook, Twitter or Website for further company information.