CrowdOptic, a startup with technology for identifying where people are pointing their smartphone cameras, has raised another $1 million in funding.
When I’ve spoken to the team in the past, they’ve emphasized the ways this could be used to create new types of social interactions — if people are attending a live event and pointing their cameras at the same thing, they can start chatting and sharing content. However, the company’s website highlights a number of use cases, including “focus-aware” advertising, analytics, news reporting, social TV (live attendees can provide content to people watching at home), and security.
CEO and co-founder Jon Fisher said that customers include Australia- and New Zealand-based ticketing company Ticketek (CrowdOptic built the company’s Friend Spotter app for finding your Facebook friends in a stadium, which you can see in the screenshot above) and Fora.tv (which used CrowdOptic to share authenticated, eyewitness content from the presidential debates).
The new funding comes from CrowdOptic’s existing investors, including Silicon Valley Bank, tech legend Ray Lane, and Fisher himself. Fisher also said that CrowdOptic recently celebrated its second quarter of profitability. The company has now raised a total of $3.5 million.
By the way, Fisher was previously CEO of Bharosa, NetClerk, and AutoReach, but he isn’t the only team member with an impressive résumé — COO Jim Kovach has worked at other startups, he has a medical degree and a law degree, and he was a linebacker for the New Orleans Saints and San Francisco 49ers.