After launching the early alpha for its user generated metaverse creation tool, Finland-based Yahaha Studios impressed two big Asian investors — Alibaba and Tencent — to pick up $40 million in series A+ funding.
The round was co-led by Singapore-headquartered Temasek and the Chinese tech giant Alibaba, following on from an earlier $50 million series A for Yahaha, which counts over 150 employees spread across Helsinki, Shanghai and Seoul.
The funding will go to growing Yahaha's product, community, workforce and ecosystem, its alpha test campaign having already recruited over 100,000 games content creators.
The Yahaha metaverse building tool aims to be comprehensible for users of all skill levels, and especially those who lack any games development expertise, allowing them to drag-and-drop their way around custom making of games, worlds and social spaces.
User-generated portals are a key draw for virtual reality worlds like Meta's Horizons Worlds or Microsoft's AltSpace AR; there's a big market for tools that help VR enthusiasts participate more easily.
With the series A+ funding, Yahaha also wants to enter the US market and other markets around Asia-Pacific, while also looking to strike partnership deals to support content creation for third-party IPs through its platform.
As well as Temasek and Alibaba, the round was also backed by China-listed metaverse and entertainment studio 37 Entertainment, whose credits include the "first ever" gaming art museum in the Metaverse, launched by Meta in April.
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