Technology

Posted on March 7, 2019 by staff

‘Star Wars’ holography tech wins backing

Technology

Cambridge based tech start-up VividQ has secured backing from Suir Valley Ventures as it looks to take the lead in 3D holography.

VividQ has developed patented software to enable commercial applications of holographic display in AR/VR headsets, smartglasses, automotive head-up displays and consumer electronics.

This creates standalone holographic representations of objects, much like the famous Star Wars projection of Leia.

Founded in 2007, the firm has since established partnerships with chipmakers, display and hardware manufacturers in the US, Taiwan and Europe to enable mass adoption of holographic display with its patented software for hologram generation.

Suir Valley Ventures, an entrepreneur-led venture capital fund launched in partnership with Shard Capital Partners LLP to invest in early-stage software, is leading an ongoing £3 million funding round.

“Suir Valley have been great to work with, both for their professionalism and deep understanding of the companies they invest in and the technology behind them,” said VividQ CEO Darran Milne.

“They demonstrate the kind of vision and passion that the deep tech companies of today need to accelerate bringing truly disruptive solutions to market.”

VividQ’s technical co-founders include engineers, mathematicians and computer scientists from the Universities of Cambridge, Oxford and St Andrews with expertise in digital holography.

The investment will enable VividQ to accelerate the adoption of its hologram-generating software, and it aims to double its Cambridge and London-based teams to implement further developments to the software framework to productise devices using holographic display in 2020.

The AR market is expected to grow from $11 billion to $61bn between 2018 and 2023 with the VR market growing from $8bn to $34bn in the same period at compound annual growth rates (CAGR) of over 30 per cent, according to Markets and Markets.

At the same time, the global display market, valued at $115.60bn in 2017, is projected to reach $206.29bn by 2025, registering a CAGR of 7.4 per cent from 2018 to 2025, according to Allied Market Research.