Rokid: $110 million investment in data glasses future
Chinese data glasses company Rokid announces a major investment.
Rokid was founded in 2014. In the first years of its existence, the startup focused on the production of smart speakers and the development of an AI assistant, later it swung to augmented reality.
Rokid operates mainly in the B2B sector, producing video glasses for industrial application fields such as remote maintenance. After the Covid 19 pandemic outbreak, it also advertised devices that can measure body temperatures.
One of the best-funded AR companies
Its latest consumer product is the Rokid Air (see cover photo), video glasses that were successfully funded on Kickstarter in 2021 and are currently being sold via Indiegogo.
For just under $500, buyers get a pair of 83-gram tech goggles with a 43-degree field of view. Like the Nreal Light, the device uses a smartphone as a player, but unlike the latter, it does not offer spatial tracking.
Now the company has raised another $110 million in a Series C funding, Techrunch writes. According to Crunchbase, the company has secured $378 million so far. This should make Rokid one of the best-funded AR startups of all time.
Rokid invests in research
Which doesn't have to mean much: AR glasses manufacturer Daqri had to cease operations in 2019 and Magic Leap also came within a hair's breadth of bankruptcy in 2020, despite similar large or even larger investments behind it. Rokid, too, has yet to prove that there is a market for video and AR glasses that justifies such sums.
The company won't name the investors, saying only that they are "ecosystem players." Rokid employs about 400 people. The new funding will go toward research and development and global expansion.
Read more about Tech Glasses:
- Magic Leap 2: Too little, too late?
- Meta's next VR goggles: all info on Project Cambria
- Playstation VR 2: Release, resolution, controller - all you need to know
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