A London-based tech start-up has secured £285,000 of seed funding for its new ‘digital reality capture’ platform.
Reality Zero One’s technology makes it easy to capture ultra-high-definition 3D versions of real-world objects to be used in any virtual or augmented reality application.
With the VR/AR market predicted to hit $215bn by 2021, potential demand for the tech is huge but the company says the high costs and difficulty of mass 3D capture has put potential users off.
Rob Eastham, co-founder of Reality Zero One, claims that’s all set to change.
“This last decade, we’ve seen a spectacular fall in the cost of reading a single genome,” he said. “We’re about to see the same thing happen to the cost of creating digital replicas of real-world objects.
“Our platform fills a clear gap in the market for creating ultra-realistic simulated 3D objects that are ready to use in any VR or AR environment.”
The start-up’s offering consists of an IoT-enabled 3D capture device, software and cloud computing infrastructure for object creation, content management and publishing.
The system will enable users to capture, create and publish ultra-realistic 3D objects at the push of a button without the need for further training, calibration, alignment or post-processing.
Reality Zero One has already secured funding from the British Robotics Seed Fund, the Startup Funding Club, the London Co-Investment Fund and a number of angel investors.
It has already shipped its first system to an early test partner at the end of March. The latest funding will be used to further refine and prepare the platform for market.
Eastham and co-founder Chris Dryden already see immediate applications for the platform in a broad range of markets including education, arts and heritage organisations, eCommerce, fashion and food.
Dominic Keen, founder of The British Robotics Seed Fund and CEO of Britbots, said: “The opportunity open to Reality Zero One is huge. We are keen to see more British companies take a share of this market and under the sound management of Chris and Rob, together with their innovative platform, we see a bright future for the company.”