BUD, a metaverse user-generated platform, has raised $36.8 million in a Series B round.
Founded in 2019 by former Snap engineers Risa Feng and Shawn Lin, Singapore-headquartered BUD is a global platform encouraging users to create and share 3D interactive experiences with its easy-to-use creation tools.
To date, over 15 million 3D experiences and assets have been created on the platform and user-generated 3D assets have been traded more than 150 million times. Since its global launch in November 2021, BUD skyrocketed to the list of top 10 social apps in more than 38 countries around the world including North America, Southeast Asia and South America.
The round was led by Sequoia Capital India with participation from ClearVue Partners, NetEase and Northern Light Venture Capital.
Existing investors GGV Capital, Qiming Venture Partners and Source Code Capital also participated in the round.
The company intends to use the fresh funding to further develop its creation tools, grow its global user base and roll out web3 products for its metaverse ecosystem. The company has revealed clear plans to launch its own NFT marketplace.
Its mobile-native creation tools require no prior coding knowledge. Without providing any preset 3D templates, BUD allows creators to build 3D experiences from scratch by using geometric modules and interactive props.
Apart from adding texts, pictures, music and videos to enrich experiences, lighting and sky-box can be adjusted as well to create an immersive environment.
BUD claims its users are young digital natives, “most of whom are teenage girls who likely do not have any coding experience but are creative and love self-expression”.
“The media of the next era will not be limited to familiar forms like text, pictures or videos, but will turn to more immersive and interactive formats. BUD is such a user-generated platform for the 3D world where everyone, not just hard-core gamers or professionals, has the chance to create and share whatever they want,” said CEO Feng.
Graduating from Cornell with a degree in Computer Science, she joined Snapchat’s AR Division in 2017 and worked on frontier Lens experiences prior to founding BUD.
Aakash Kapoor, VP, Sequoia India, added: “BUD is establishing itself as a social destination for GenZ while uniquely enabling ownership of content in the metaverse.
“Millions of users are creating content on BUD and sharing their creations on social media, aiding the inherent virality of the BUD platform.
“We are impressed by the passion with which the founders have built BUD, and are excited about their future plans for localisation and growth.”