10 October, 2019
LONDON & CAMBRIDGE, UK & SAN FRANCISCO, USA: Ahren today announced its investment in 6D.ai, after taking part in their most recent funding round alongside General Catalyst.
6D.ai, a pioneer in using computer vision to build real-time 3D reconstructions on standard smartphones, offers businesses and developers the ability to build Augmented Reality (“AR”) applications, applying world-class scientific research to provide a leading commercial solution in a fast-growing market.
6D develops application programming interfaces (“APIs”) that build 3D reconstructions of the world on device using only a standard built-in monocular smartphone camera. Developers can then use these 3D reconstructions (“meshes”) to build semantic APIs, which overlays the meshes on top of the physical world, allowing for semantic understanding and interactions.
Ahren believes that computer vision has the potential to transform how we interact with our physical environment and each other. Progress in computer vision is vital for the success of AR applications, allowing computers to see and understand their physical space. 6D understands the problems preventing current AR engagement in applications and their platform allows developers to create AR solutions for ubiquitous use in devices already in users’ pockets.
Fortune 500 companies (Accenture, Autodesk, Nexus Studios, Qualcomm, Torch) and over 6,000 developers are using 6D’s APIs for inspection, remote assistance and 3D layout & design. 6D is a preferred partner of Qualcomm collaborating to provide spatial understanding for Snapdragon-powered XR1 head mounted displays.
Founded in November 2017, 6D.ai is a start-up that emerged from Oxford University’s Active Vision Lab, which develops APIs to help developers build augmented reality capabilities into their apps, solving some of the hardest computer vision problems. The Oxford Active Vision Lab has been specializing in augmented reality since 1995 bringing 23 years of research and invention to the AR industry, including creating SLAM on mobile phones back in 2007.
6D’s “Reality Platform” offers a set of cloud services and mobile native SDKs which help developers create apps that can interact with the world in a natural and realistic way, helping them solve hard problems in AR including persistence, multiplayer, and occlusion.
Ahren Innovation Capital is an investment institution that supports transformational companies at the intersection of deep tech and deep science that will penetrate, or create, massive markets. Ahren is a unique partnership of investment talent and best-in-class commercial scientists whose technologies are today valued in excess of $100BN combined.
Ahren believes in taking asymmetric, considered, risk that will deliver superior rewards – capturing a generational opportunity to provide smart capital to deep technology.
With a philosophy espousing the importance of relationships and trust, Ahren provides both patient and active capital to exceptional founders and teams, empowering them to succeed.
Ahren’s Founding and Science Partners include:
Alice Newcombe-Ellis, Founder & CEO, formerly an investor at TPG Capital and Lansdowne Partners, Double First Class degree in Mathematics and Master’s in Maths & Physics from the University of Cambridge; Fulbright and Baker Scholar at Harvard Business School.
Sir Shankar Balasubramanian, principal inventor of the leading next generation human genome sequencing technology core to all Illumina sequencing platforms, estimated worth >$30BN.
Professor Roberto Cipolla, Professor of Information Engineering at Cambridge University, Director of Toshiba Research Europe.
Professor John Daugman, Head of Artificial Intelligence Group of Cambridge University, inventor of IRIS (eye) recognition technology used to register 1.5BN citizens worldwide.
Professor Zoubin Ghahramani, world leader in machine learning, co-founder of Geometric Intelligence, sold to Uber for an undisclosed amount.
Professor Steve Jackson, founder/co-founder of three companies and originator of Olaparib/Lynparza, recently partnered by AstraZeneca with Merck and valued as an asset at up to $17BN.
Professor Andy Parker, CERN leader, Head of the Cavendish Laboratory (Physics Department) of Cambridge University.
Sir Venki Ramakrishnan, Nobel prize laureate and President of the Royal Society, the UK’s premier science body.
Lord Martin Rees, world-renowned astrophysicist, Astronomer Royal, founder of CSER, former President of the Royal Society and former Master of Trinity College, Cambridge University.
Sir Gregory Winter, 2018 Nobel laureate, inventor of technology leading to Humira ($18BN sales in 2017, the world’s greatest grossing drug) and founder of three companies. Master of Trinity College, Cambridge University.
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