Virtual Reality Startup Sandbox VR Raises Another $11m in Celebrity-Backed Funding Round

Location-based virtual reality startup Sandbox VR, makers of the Star Trek: Discovery Away Mission VR experience, have just secured an additional $11m in a new funding round.

Quoting a piece from Variety, “The company’s new funding round was led by David Sacks of Craft Ventures and the Andreessen Horowitz Cultural Leadership Fund, with the Dreamers Fund and Rich Kleiman of Thirty Five Ventures participating as well.” Those guys weren’t the headline-grabbers, though; funders also included a handful of celebrities such as Will Smith, Justin Timberlake, Katy Perry, and Orlando Bloom, as well as sports personalities Kevin Durant and Keisuke Honda. The funding comes shortly ahead of a new facility opening in San Francisco, which Variety reports will host the new Star Trek experience that Sandbox VR announced back in July. The $11m from this round brings the total funding raised by the company to an impressive $83 million.

Steve Zhao, the founder and CEO of Sandbox VR praised his new celebrity backers, saying, “Their support is a vote of confidence that our platform will one day become the new medium for the future of sports, music, and storytelling.”

Star Trek: Discovery Away Mission is one of Sandbox VR’s flagship properties. In the 30-minute experience, a team of up to 6 players will investigate a distress signal from a lost starship, an adventure that takes them, among other places, to an ice moon. The experience features the voice talents of Mary Wiseman as Ensign Sylvia Tilly. The experience also uses full-body motion capture, and focuses more on collective problem-solving than combat scenarios.

Sandbox VR currently operates locations in several cities across the world, with plans to open further locations in New York, Dallas, and Chicago, among others.