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Niantic Labs extends its funding for Pokemon GO and other location games to $25 million

Still working on Ingress and new titles

Date Type Companies involved Size
February 26th, 2016 investment Niantic $5m
Niantic Labs extends its funding for Pokemon GO and other location games to $25 million

San Francisco-based "real world games" developer Niantic Labs has closed an additional $5 million as part of its series A funding round.

This is on top of the $20 million already raised from Google, Nintendo, and The Pokémon Company Group in October 2015 - a deal which also promised $10 million on completion of certain deadlines.

This new round of funding comes courtesy of Alsop Louie Partners, You & Mr Jones, Fuji TV and angel investors Cyan and Scott Banister, and Lucas Nealan.

Board reshuffle

“Niantic was founded on the concept of building interactive experiences using mobile technology to encourage people to engage with the world around them,” said John Hanke, CEO, Niantic.

“I’m delighted to be adding this set of partners to the Niantic family. Each brings a unique capability to our team.”

Additionally, as part of this new round of funding, Gilman Louie, a partner at Alsop Louie Partners, will be joining Niantic's Board of Directors.

Innovative work

“We’re impressed with the innovative work that John and his team at Niantic started at Google and are continuing to deliver against as an independent company,” said Louie.

“I am also thrilled and honored to be joining the Niantic Board of Directors and look forward to helping them realize their full potential in the emerging AR/VR/MR market.“

The funding will be used to work on the upcoming Pokémon GO, due out some time in 2016, as well as to continue work on Niantic's first game, Ingress, and work on "new real world games".


Contributing Editor

A Pocket Gamer co-founder, Jon is Contributing Editor at PG.biz which means he acts like a slightly confused uncle who's forgotten where he's left his glasses. As well as letters and cameras, he likes imaginary numbers and legumes.