AI Avatar Startup ‘Alter’ and Why is Google Taking Over It?

Google pays $100 million for the artificial intelligence avatar startup Alter

Google has acquired Alter, an artificial intelligence (AI) avatar startup that was developing AI avatars for social media users and brands to express their virtual identities. Google paid around $100 million for the startup in order to improve its content game and compete with TikTok. The acquisition was completed about two months ago, but neither company announced it publicly. According to the report, some of Alter top executives have updated their LinkedIn profiles to reveal that they have joined Google without acknowledging the acquisition. A Google spokesperson confirmed the acquisition of Alter but declined to comment on the financial terms of the transaction.

Alter began as Facemoji, a platform that provided plug-and-play technology to assist game and app developers in adding avatar systems to their applications. Play Ventures, Roosh Ventures, and Twitter, which invested $3 million in the startup, are among its investors. Facemoji was later rebranded as Alter. Alter founders Jon Slimak and Robin Raszka did not respond to a request for comment. Meanwhile, Google recently added custom emojis to Chat for a more personalised experience. Emojis are a great way for users to express themselves in Google Chat. Avatar startups have come and gone in recent years, but the future that many of the entrepreneurs behind them predicted has proven to be more or less accurate. Apple is becoming more interested in avatar representations via Memoji, Mark Zuckerberg wants Facebook to be a metaverse company, and platforms like Roblox, where users enter a virtual world and purchase accessories for their character, have never been more popular.

Facemoji is developing a plug-and-play technology platform to assist game and app developers in incorporating avatar systems into their apps using the startup's SDK. Facemoji has raised $3 million in seed funding led by Play Ventures, with participation from Twitter and Roosh Ventures, as well as some angel investors. The startup's lightweight solution relies on its own rendering pipeline, whereas most other players in the space rely on Unity plugins, which many developers dislike. They also have a complete, diverse system of avatar art that developers can use right away if they wish.

Facemoji believes that more game developers want to easily build their own avatar systems without having to connect to other networks. The ambition to build a consistent crossplatform avatar system that functioned as its own metaverse was frequently the Achilles' heel of most early avatar platforms. It makes sense for the startup developing the product and its users, but it was a squandered opportunity for game developers. Facemoji says it does not expect Apple to open up Memoji to the developer community, and that Snap is a more visible competitor. Facemoji's startup competitors are being acquired at an increasing rate. Roblox acquired Loom.ai in 2020, and Epic Games acquired HyperSense. The startup's founders are still fascinated by the metaverse hype and the latest NFT craze, and they have been working on plug-and-play NFT storefronts that developers can integrate to allow their users to buy avatar accessories. Facemoji sees early crypto Twitter profile pic usage as a sign that regular consumers will be excited about customising their avatars.

"It all comes down to ego," says Facemoji CEO Robin Raszka to TechCrunch. "How do you flaunt your Birkin bag, avatars on Twitter are prime real estate for this, people just want to show off." It's an especially intriguing investment for Twitter, which is a rare corporate investor. Before being acquired by Twitter, the Facemoji team said they discussed integrating their avatars with the team at screen-sharing social app Squad. Twitter has also revealed a number of upcoming NFT projects, and CEO Jack Dorsey has been a vocal supporter of startups in the space. Facemoji's team hopes that, in addition to gaming, people will soon be able to easily dial into their next Zoom as an avatar or attend a class as one, and that live-action avatar overlays will lose some of their silly reputation in favour of being treated as a healthy medium between having your camera on and off.