Paracosm, a cloud-based software firm, has secured $3.3m in funding for its 3D mapping technology.
The round was led by Atlas Venture, with participation from Osage University Partners (OUP), BoldStart Ventures, New World Angels, and Deep Fork Capital. The funding adds to a seed round held in December last year, worth $800,000, which came via the Florida Institute for Commercialisation of Public Research and the Vegas Tech Nimbus Fund.
The company is developing 3D mapping technology that can generate virtual worlds derived from the user’s surroundings, and can be used in robotics, video games, special effects, navigation systems, and virtual reality. The startup is using technology licensed from the University of Florida, hence the investment from OUP which requires a company to either be a university spin-out or utilising technology licensed from one of its partner universities.
Amir Rubin, founder and CEO of Paracosm, said: “Paracosm wants to take the digital world beyond screens and enable machines to understand the world as we do. We envision a future where the digital world is seamlessly integrated into our lives. When humans and machines have a joint understanding of our world it opens up endless opportunities. Imagine a robot that can find your keys or deliver a pizza directly to a desk in a busy office building. Imagine building a video game level out of the furniture in your living room or playing an augmented reality game in which zombies chase you around your own home. Allowing machines to understand the physical realm will change the world.”