A few days back, we reported the UK-based Augmented Reality(AR) startup Blippar filing bankruptcy. Post the administration process, Blippar’s assets including the intellectual property went up for sale.
Raimo van der Klein, Co-founder of Layar, was seen gathering a consortium of investors to bid for parts of the Augmented Reality start-up along with another co-founder Layar Maarten Lens-FitzGerald.
In a recent development, Raimo van der Klein lost the bid in the blind auction organised by the curator. He then took LinkedIn and said, “So just heard that we didn’t win the bid for Layar. We had a small chance. The most likely scenario is that someone snatched the whole lot. Probably coming days we will hear more. This process the last month has really sparked many great ideas and showed me interesting opportunities in the Augmented Reality space. For now lets find out who is going to get Layar and what their plans are and take it from there. The story always continues..”
Having said that, the party who bought the property of Layar is still unknown and Van Der Klein has confirmed it. To make it clear, Layar was acquired by Blippar back in 2014 for £4m in cash to incorporate their technology into Blippar.
Even after selling the startup to Blippar, both the founders Raimo van der Klein and Maarten Lens-Fitzgerald were pretty vocal about their disapproval with regard to the transaction and Blippar’s business strategy.
Based out of Amsterdam, Layar was founded by Claire Boonstra, Maarten Lens-FitzGerald, and Raimo Van Der Klein in 2009. Layar is all about designing and developing mobile augmented reality browsers and interactive print tools. The app allowed users to use their smartphone camera to find out information in various categories.
Stay tuned to Silicon Canals for more updates in the tech startup world.
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