Overview Ark connects live concerts with a MMOCP (massively multiplayer online concert platform) to make virtual concerts accessible to all artists and the 2.7 billion gamers in the world.
The ARK is more than a metaverse. It's a vibrant music-based ecosystem, where artists around the world can reach the audiences they deserve, and fans can explore an incredible landscape of the greatest music on Earth.
It's a fully persistent and evolving virtual world, where you can attend concerts, buy merch, go on quests or even hang out with friends. It also includes the ARK Portal, connecting real-world concerts with virtual ones. It’s accessible to fans at a live venue, and also on their MAC, PC, mobile and in VR. Overview Ark is not here to disrupt the music industry, we're here to make virtual concerts accessible to all artists and fans.
We provide tools for artists and the music industry, enabling a new era of creativity, music experiences, direct-to-fan relationships and collaborations. Our approach is at the intersection of the arts, music, new media, gaming, and technology, a convergence of innovations that will enable a new generation of artists to engage with their fans and perform like never before.
The ARK delivers on the outlined criteria as a platform at the crossroads of tech and the creative industries, at the cutting edge of what is possible to enable new creative outputs and services for artists and the music industry.
Overview Ark was founded in June 2020, and went on to be accepted onto two Digital Catapult Accelerators, named “an immersive startup to watch in 2021” by Business Leader UK, and “an immersive startup that could change the world” by Business Cloud. Our team held prototype events that were a part of SXSW XR online 2021, Cannes XR 2021, and will have a presence at Manchester Un-Convention, Athens Music Week, MIL, LineCheck, and MaMA Festival as a part of the JUMP European Music Market Programme we were selected for out of hundred of international startups that applied.
We have already successfully held events in virtual worlds, with thousands attending a new form of hybrid event that combines game design, quest elements, live music and film, while physical events in Paris, London, Hamburg and Amsterdam are connected in a synchronized portal between the real and virtual world.
Our vision is to create a persistent multiplayer world with endlessly discoverable music, quests, characters and places, and to make this available to the hundreds of thousands of artists who are currently unable to tour or reach their fans, and to venues that have struggled to survive during the pandemic.
The virtual concert industry is in its earliest stages, but already it is becoming a monopoly, where only wealthy established acts can take part. This means that an entire generation of performers will be deprived of the access and tools required to interface with the global audiences of gamers and virtual concert goers.
Overview Ark’s mission is to put these tools in the hands of artists, to help usher in a new era of music and creativity.
Being a CIC CreaTech One to Watch 2021 will help us reach, collaborate with and support music artists and music industry professionals who currently have limited access to the virtual concert industry. It will bring greater awareness to our current partnerships across the UK, US, and Europe, and open new opportunities for festival and venue collaborations and new talent discovery as we grow our team. After prototype testing in 2020 and 2021, we are in the process of raising our first round of investment with lead investors on board, beginning to scale our team with new hires and rapidly develop the next iteration of our platform for open access.
