STRIVR, a leader in immersive virtual reality (VR) training, announced a $16-million round of financing led by GreatPoint Ventures (GPV) to advance the company’s expansion into the enterprise market. With this investment, GPV Managing Partner Ray Lane also joined the company’s Board of Directors.
Immersive experiences are highlighted as one of Gartner’s Top 10 technology trends for 2018 and beyond. Gartner predicts that “by 2021, 25% of large businesses in mature markets will pilot and deploy mixed reality (MR) solutions, from 1% today.”2 Leading this charge at scale is Walmart, as it works with STRIVR to roll out 17,000 Oculus Go’s for VR training to more than one million associates starting next month.
“In a world rapidly shifting to asset performance and predictive analytics, human capital has been largely ignored with outdated training and development tools,” said Lane. “STRIVR offers companies like Walmart real-world, immersive experiences utilizing VR to place employees into their actual work environments to be trained, affecting their ability to drive both workforce development and retention.”
A fast-growing list of enterprise customers including JetBlue, Fidelity, Tyson Foods and United Rentals are also working with STRIVR to innovate and transform employee learning. Results from these innovations are being realized quickly, as evidenced by Tyson Foods in its general safety/hazard awareness training. In the initial pilot, the company experienced a more than 20% reduction in injuries and illnesses compared to the year prior, with 89% of learners saying they felt more prepared after VR training.
“This is a critical time at STRIVR and we are beyond-excited about GreatPoint Ventures’ investment,” said Derek Belch, CEO, STRIVR. “Ray and his team bring a wealth of knowledge and experience to help us effectively operate at scale as we expand in the enterprise space – and we’re humbled by the belief in our team and our winning approach to helping customers take learning and training to new heights.”
To support STRIVR’s growing base of customers, the company has now also opened offices in New York, Seattle, and Nashville, TN in addition to its existing offices in Los Angeles and Menlo Park, CA.
