Portl, the startup behind a ‘holoportation machine’ telepresence product, has secured a $3 million boost after a successful funding round.
The company says it ‘beams’ people across the globe in real time so they can see hear and interact with audiences anywhere in the world, who in turn will view them in 4K resolution.
The $3 million (approximately €2.5 million) seed round of funding was led by venture capitalist investor Tim Draper, who was an early investor in Tesla, Skype, Coindesk, SpaceX and Twitch. The funding will help develop the proprietary display, design and live video streaming software, content management, and delivery platform that go into Portl products.
Epic Portl Hologram Machine, the company’s first product, supports human sized, life-like interactive communication.
David Nussbaum, founder of Portl, describes Portl as “the first and only, completely self-contained, 4K resolution, single-passenger holoportation machine in the world”.
Nussbaum said: “Having not only Tim’s endorsement, but his partnership, is really the dream. I created this machine based on my own experience in tech and entertainment and I knew people would be excited to have access to holographic telepresence in a compact device. Every day we discover more uses for our Portl machines, and I have no doubt they’ll soon be everywhere, bringing people together no matter how far apart they are on the map.”