Korean eyewear brand Gentle Monster invests $15M in AR tech startup Nreal

The investment news came just after the launch of the new glasses.
Phone with the Nreal logo and a glasses in the background
The AR glasses maker has set its sights on overseas markets.

Chinese AR eyewear company Nreal has announced that it has raised $15 million just after the launch of its new glasses. The investment round was led by IICombined, the parent company of Gentle Monster.

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The company also left an investment round led by Alibaba with $60 million last March. According to the data provided by CrunchBase, the amount of investment received by the company in the total of Series A, B, C, and Angel rounds reached $246 million.

Nreal, which has already delivered its Nreal Light model to the end user, introduced the Nreal Air and Nreal X models with its launch recently. Unlike conventional augmented reality glasses, Nreal is known for developing stylish and easy-to-use products.

Peng Jin, Co-Founder of Nreal, comments on the investment:

“Gentle Monster is a fantastic fashion brand for eyewear with truly inspirational designs. We feel fashion and design will be important aspects in the future development of AR glasses, as we continue to expand the sector’s consumer base. As such, having Gentle Monster as our investor will open up interesting opportunities not just for Nreal, but also for the wider AR industry as a whole.”

In addition to the two AR glasses, the company recently introduced the AR adapter, allowing Apple iPhones and iPads to be connected to Nreal Air. Thanks to this adapter, users can easily play the digital contents of the devices on the glasses.

Related: Niantic acquires AR-focused studio NZXR

The products stand out with their lightness. Which will live up to its name, Nreal Air has a light weight of only 79 grams, while the Nreal x weighs 106 grams. The company is headquartered in Beijing, but its main target is overseas. The first glasses were only released in South Korea, Japan, and Europe. However, Nreal Light was the only Nreal model released in the US on its first day.

When we look at the information provided through the company’s developer portal, it is seen that the Nreal AR Jam competition awarded up to 100 thousand dollars to the developers, but this competition ended last month. Nreal aims to improve the application and technology ecosystem with such actions. You can access the company’s Unity-compatible SDK kit by clicking here and getting detailed information.

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