Google has acquired Owlchemy Labs for an undisclosed amount. The Austin, Texas studio is best known for Job Simulator and has recently released Rick and Morty Simulator: Virtual Rick-ality. A blog post on Owlchemy’s site reads, “We’re positively thrilled that Owlchemy Labs has been acquired by Google! We couldn’t be happier.” The company previously secured $5 million Series A funding last August, led by Qualcomm Ventures. Interestingly, another investor in the first round was Google competitor and rival VR platform holder, HTC.
Future Perfect
The company was established in 2010 and turned its attention to VR in 2013, “Once we dipped our toes into the VR waters in the early DK1 days, we quickly vowed to never look back and build a flat-screen game again, and to jump headfirst into the awesome potential of VR.”
We were so impressed with Job Simulator that it landed Owlchemy Labs a place on our 25 Developers To Watch feature, where we said, "Owlchemy are continually pushing the boundaries - and doing it with style!" It seems Google agrees with us.
Expanding on how the acquisition will affect the studio’s output, Owlchemy said, “Our plan to build awesome things will continue forward stronger than ever. Owlchemy will continue building high quality VR content for platforms like the HTC Vive, Oculus Touch, and PlayStation VR.” Whew!
“We believe that VR is the most accessible computing platform and that there’s a ton of work to be done.” We look forward to seeing what those clever owl scientists can create with Google in their corner.
