Niantic invests heavily for the creation of a “Metaverse in the real world” (AR)
Everyone sees the Metaverse at their doorstep. On the Facebook side (sorry, Meta), it is above all a huge park of activities in VR (even if mixed reality can be invited to the party), from leisure activities to interpersonal communication through the VR teleworking, while on the side of Niantic (the father of Pokémon Go), it is a question of creating nothing less than a “Metavers in the real world”.
In order to achieve this goal, the AR games specialist has just raised $ 300 million (from the Coatue investment fund), an amount that now values Niantic at $ 9 billion. The studio is currently working on “real-size” AR tools and applications, tools that will generate AR elements in everyone’s environment.
Thanks to this fundraising, Matt Mazzeo, one of Coatue’s senior executives, has in a way “leaked” Niantic’s “big project”: “Niantic is building a platform for AR based on a map. 3D world that we believe will play a critical role in the next IT transition. We are excited to partner with Niantic as we see this infrastructure supporting a real-world metaverse and fostering the next evolution of the Internet ” . The pawns seem to fall into place .