A French startup is already positioning itself as the first event solution metaverse world. With a pre-seed fundraising of 4 million euros and brought by three recognized entrepreneurs – Raphaël Assouline, Jérôme Guilmet and Zack Sabban -, RLTY deploys business and creative potential at full strength.
RLTY aims to support brands and event companies in discovering and conquering the metaverse. They are free to invest in them according to their problems: a new space for play, expression and creation, a new opportunity to anchor a link in their community, a new place of exchange, new business possibilities… RLTY tools are designed. to be easy to use and democratize entry into these new virtual worlds.
Raphaël Assouline is one of the co-founders of RLTY. He examines the first months of the startup, the challenges it has faced and the improvements it has planned.
Can you introduce RLTY to us in a few words?
Raphael Assouline : RLTY launched in January 2022. It makes the metaverse accessible to brands and event companies to enable them to deploy unique and personalized experiences in virtual worlds. We offer our customers an interface that connects most of the players on the market so that they can create, with a few clicks and at an affordable cost, a first experience. The customer comes to our platform, chooses his metaverse, his virtual building, personalizes it (decoration, logo, etc.) There are many: broadcast a physical event live, deploy on virtual stands with institutional videos, participate and interact with exhibitors thanks to their avatars, have an NFT shop or virtual goodies, launch quizzes, position networking spaces, etc. Once configured, the client is ready to initiate activity, by a landing page that we offer. All this can be done in 15 minutes.
Who is behind the RLTY project? How was he born?
We are three co-founders of RLTY: Zack Sabban, Jérôme Guilmet and me. We created, together with Jérôme, the company Geronimo, specialized in the design and development of personalized mobile applications for companies, which was acquired in 2018 by OnePoint. After this adventure, I became passionate about investing, cryptocurrencies, NFT and the rise of metaverses. Zack, on the other hand, set up Festicket, the market which sells tickets for concerts and festivals, but which, above all, launches a complete range of services, with trips, accommodation, connected payment bracelets, etc. . So it knows the event industry very well. I also, on my side, work in this field by launching the startup Handyamo that rents touch tablets for short periods for professional events.
When, in 2020, the events industry stopped, Zack moved his business to virtual events. Their limitations are easily highlighted: the participants are passive in front of a screen, without interaction. However, we are seeing the beginning of what could be a virtual event. At the end of 2021, after sharing many thoughts and ideas, the three of us decided to launch ourselves. In January 2022, RLTY will be on its feet.
What needs does RLTY meet?
RLTY responds to a utilitarian and functional need, exacerbated by the pandemic: bringing people together at a distance (professional or festival), through a quality experience, around a specific and common interest. Thanks to their avatar, participants also have control over their interactions and their journey. RLTY also responds to the needs of brands to reach a new target of consumers: a young generation and a generation captivated by cryptocurrencies and NFT, in search of places to use .
We are convinced that virtual 3D spaces are a new Internet. In the coming months and years, we will use the Internet with more and more rich and engaging experiences. Today we interact with our computers, tomorrow we will go through virtual reality headsets. New higher quality versions are now in full development among the greatest. With RLTY, we want to allow brands to enter these worlds and launch, initially, with point experiences. This, for them, is an opportunity to position themselves.
You have recently succeeded in raising 4 million euros: can you tell us more?
We closed a fundraising round of €4 million in June, thanks to 80 renowned investors such as the founders of Sorare, The Sandbox, Meero and Jellysmack, and funds such as Kima Ventures, Blue Wire Capital and Monoceros Venture . We bring together players from Web2, Web3, gaming and NFT. This fundraising is intended to accelerate our product launch and complete our teams, with Tech, Marketing and Sales recruitments.
What are your projects?
RLTY has organized many national and international events: the Metaverse Summit and the NFT Expoverse LA in July, the BPIFrance Metaverse Vision in June, the metaverse festival MET AMSthe Betting on NFT Daysthe first NFT Movie Festival in Cannes… We meet great success every time. Our next events will be musical: a collaboration with the Illenium music festival and a format of weekly nights at the Amnesia club (Ibiza). We will animate communities on NFT topics.
In a few months, RLTY was able to convince and deploy its services to major festivals, artists, art fairs and exhibitions, trade shows, fashion designers and luxury brands. A pioneer in its field, the startup opens many fields of action and possible interactions to all those who want to launch themselves. At a time when brands and artists seek to unite and delight their communities, virtual worlds appear as new lands to explore.