Superplastic has created a large number of bizarre NFTs and characters, which Amazon Studios can now utilize for television or film. It could be significant metaverse news.
Alexa Fund, Amazon’s venture capital arm, sponsored a Series A-4 investment round of $20 million for the 3D character company Superplastic. Superplastic develops “synthetic celebrities” and vinyl toys, and has already released NFT collections on Ethereum and partnered with major brands such as Gucci and “Fortnite” by Epic Games.
Google Ventures, Galaxy Digital, Sony Japan, Animoca Brands, Craft Ventures, and others participated in the round, bringing Superplastic’s total funding to date to $58 million.
Amazon Studios will get a “first-look deal” with Superplastic for any TV or film pitches starring Superplastic’s characters. Amazon Studios, which produced “The Boys” and “Fleabag,” is developing “The Janky & Guggimon Show,” starring two Superplastic virtual celebrities.
“Janky & Guggimon” will focus on the characters’ pursuit of fame and money. Both Janky and Guggimon have millions of social media followers and are anthropomorphic animals with the ability to break the laws of physics, blurring the line between fiction and reality.
A statement says that the two characters are “lazy and spectacularly incompetent best friends.” It calls Janky a “loveable idiot who spends his spare time scamming celebrities” and Guggimon a “fashion icon and master manipulator who’s too narcissistic to care.”
Janky explained in a statement why he is enthusiastic about Amazon’s involvement and why it is significant.
“We went frum [sic] snatchin’ Amazon boxes off porches, to getting Amazon bags, baby,” he said.
What will happen next?
Paul Bernard, who is in charge of Amazon’s Alexa Fund, stated in a statement that “meeting their customers where they are” is a large part of the attractiveness of Superplastic’s characters.
“We see them as a new class of IP that is going to be increasingly relevant with younger generations,” Bernard said.
“This includes technologies such as synthetics, and virtualization to generative AI and Web3, and more,” he said.
“Amazon wants to place strategic bets on these areas alongside our continued investment in startups furthering voice use cases, as it’s a part of our company’s core values to look towards the future at long-term investments that will position us well, even if it takes some time for these technologies to fully come to fruition in our day-to-day lives,” Bernard added.
To far, Superplastic has created about 25,000 NFTs across numerous collections, including a PFP collection ($3.2 million in total volume traded) and an NFT collaboration with Gucci (almost $10 million in volume). Since the release of Cryptojankyz’s NFT collection in July 2021, a total volume of almost $15,2 million has been traded.
Content Source: decrypt.com
Cover Image Source: flipboard.com
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