AmazeVR, a virtual reality concert platform that enables users to experience their favorite artists’ VR concerts through content generation tools, announced today it has secured $15 million, which was oversubscribed within three weeks.

Partners Investment and Murex Partners co-led the new funding, with participation from Smilegate Investment, Quantum Ventures Korea, ABC Partners, Everrich Group, GS Group's corporate venture capital firm GS Futures, We Ventures, Base Investment and Dunamu&Partners; and previous backers Mirae Asset Venture Investment, Mirae Asset Capital, Partners Investment and Timewise Investment.

AmazeVR has raised a total of $30.8 million since its inception in 2015 and plans to raise a Series B in early 2022 to drive its rapid growth, the company said. Co-CEO of AmazeVR Ernest Lee told TechCrunch that the startup would use the fresh capital for hiring additional headcount. AmazeVR began 2021 with 12 employees, but now the company has tripled its team in Hollywood and Seoul with 41 employees, Lee noted.

“We’ve been able to attract top talent from the [music, entertainment, tech and gaming] industries we touch,” Lee said. “This puts us in an ideal position to take full advantage of VR and the metaverse’s growing popularity, as we deliver breathtaking VR concerts from major artists, first to theaters, then to homes worldwide.”

In the wake of social media, fans have unprecedented access to their favorite artists but are still separated by a screen. VR concerts by AmazeVR take the fan across the screen to come face-to-face with their favorite artists to create a human connection, Lee said. Users would join as avatars, hang out with other users, and experience VR concerts together.

“Our goal is for the technology to be so good that it becomes invisible so that the fan’s memory is not that of a great VR experience, but it’s that they actually came face to face with their favorite artists in fantastical immersive environments, blurring the lines of reality,” Lee said in an interview with TechCrunch.