Mercia Technologies PLC (“Mercia”), a Midlands-based investment group building, funding and commercialising technology businesses across the UK, will invest up to a further £2m into the virtual reality (VR) games developer/publisher nDreams Limited. In addition, it will also invest up to £2.5m into newly ‘emerging star, Intelligent Positioning, a cloud-based software analytics developer.
The nDreams investment follows the recent reveals for its first major title, The Assembly, which was exhibited to the public for the first time at the EGX videogames expo at Birmingham’s NEC in September. The Assembly’s full commercial release will coincide with the launch of the first major Virtual Reality (VR) headsets next year.
nDreams creates immersive interactive entertainment for forthcoming VR headsets, including Oculus Rift, HTC Vive and PlayStation VR. Two of its titles, Gunner and Perfect Beach, have already been launched on Samsung Gear VR, which became commercially available to the public on November 20th. Perfect Beach is also available to download for Google Cardboard from the Google Play Store.
Mercia Technologies has also made its first investment into newly developed emerging star Intelligent Positioning (IP), which has moved across the Mercia Group from an investment held via Mercia Fund Management (“MFM”), the FCA-authorised, wholly owned third party fund management business of Mercia Technologies PLC.
IP is a developer of innovative real-time search intelligence and Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) analytics solutions for businesses. The company has developed an online platform called ‘Pi Datametrics’, to aid corporations with marketing optimisation and business intelligence using search engines such as Google and YouTube. Since MFM’s initial investment, the company has secured a number of blue-chip clients, including AXA Investment Management, Invesco, L’Oréal, River Island, Waterstones, M&S and Clarks.
Dr Mark Payton, CEO of Mercia Technologies, said:
“We are delighted to invest in nDreams and Intelligent Positioning, which are both perfect examples of ‘emerging stars’ from the MFM portfolio, having both made significant progress since their initial, early stage investments.
“With both virtual reality and SEO monitoring looking set to become amongst the most disruptive markets of 2016, we look forward to seeing what the next year holds in store for both businesses.”
Patrick O’Luanaigh, CEO of nDreams, said:
“I’m delighted to be strengthening our relationship with Mercia Technologies. We have been working with the Mercia team for some time now and they believed in the potential of VR from our very first conversations. Mercia has been extremely supportive while we’ve continued to expand our studio.
“This additional investment allows us to extend our capabilities as a publisher and accelerate our efforts as we head into 2016 – the big ‘Year One’ for VR.”
Daniel Titterton, Co-Founder and CEO of Intelligent Positioning, said:
“We are delighted to be building a close relationship with the Mercia Technologies team. Their guidance and support continues to galvanise our business with new levels of confidence and discipline.
“The opportunity that we see in our sector is vast and the value of Pi Datametrics delivers to our customers has proven to be exceptional. We are, as a team, very excited.”