Augmented reality (AR) is very much a buzz word at the moment with Apple’s ARKit now supported with iOS 11 and Google’s ARCore also recently rolled out to developers. Back in July startup Mira revealed its take on AR, unveiling a headset that offers a middle ground between smartphone-based AR apps and high-end headsets like HoloLens or Meta 2 called Prism. Now the company has secured $1 million USD in funding and begun shipping out the developer kits.
The investment round was led by Greylock Partners, Founders Fund Angel, and Macro Ventures, bringing Mira’s total funding raised to date to $2.5 million. Mira will be using the funding to provide more resources to its growing developer community and bolster Mira’s content partnership initiatives.
Pre-orders for the Mira Prism began in July for $99 rather than the full retail price of $149. Developers who’ve ordered kits will begin receiving them soon as shipments have now begun, with Mira starting to ship the Discovery Edition Prism headset this holiday, with a wider consumer release scheduled for 2018.
“The reception we’ve seen for the Prism headset and our vision for enabling developers to create premium, shared AR experiences has been overwhelming, and we are honored to add the expertise of Greylock Partners, Founders Fund Angel, and Macro Ventures to the fold,” said Ben Taft, co-founder and CEO of Mira. “We’ve already seen select developers build incredible experiences with our SDK, and we’re eager to see what the wider community creates now that our software is more widely available.”
Supporting the iPhone 6, 6s, 7, 8, the Mira Prism reflects the smartphone screen back at the wearer using specially curved and coated lenses. Users simply open an app on their iPhone, slide the phone into the Prism headset then use the accompanying remote to navigate.
VRFocus will continue its coverage of Mira Prism, reporting back with the latest updates.
via Mint VR