CastAR glasses can project 3D images in front of your eyes so that you feel like you’re seeing a virtual layer on top of the real world, or you’re immersed inside a game world. It works with glasses and a sheet-like material called ‘retro-reflective.’
While you could theoretically use the reflective sheets to animate an entire room, CastAR has decided to focus on using smaller sheets for tabletop gaming. The money from Rubin’s Playground Global investment firm brings a variety of benefits, including office space and technical know-how, said David Henkel-Wallace, the chief executive of Mountain View, Calif.-based CastAR, in an interview with GamesBeat.
CastAR has a lot of competition, from Google (which might one day create a new version of its Google Glass project) to Magic Leap, an augmented reality company in Florida with a lot of funding from Google. It will also likely compete with virtual reality companies (which provide goggles that are more immersive because they put you inside virtual worlds) like Facebook’s Oculus VR. But Rubin’s investment brings a very important ally into CastAR’s camp, as Rubin has a lot of money as well as a ton of connections in the tech world.
“One thing you look for investors is what kind of network they have,” Henkel-Wallace said. “It’s really a different kind of firm. They’re very focused on hardware businesses, and they have a model where they’re kind of an incubator. We just closed this deal and we’re already finding them useful.”