In the 2022 fiscal year, Improbable, which is backed by SoftBank, recorded a loss of £19 million - a decrease of over 85% from the £131 million loss it reported the year before. Improbable cited cost savings achieved through the scaling of virtual events as part of the reason for the drop in losses. The company, founded in 2012, has been trying to develop enormous, perpetually running universes where thousands of people can engage in gaming and connect with one another.
On Wednesday, virtual reality startup Improbable reported its "best financial year" on record with revenues more than doubling to £78 million ($95 million). Despite pivoting its focus to the 'metaverse', the company managed to reduce losses by 85%, with total losses of £19 million in the 2022 fiscal year compared to £131 million the year prior. This decrease was largely due to a dramatic reduction in the cost of running mass-scale virtual events, which has fallen from millions of pounds to hundreds of thousands. Additionally, Improbable's divestment of two games studios and defense unit led to their current cash balance of £140 million, signifying ongoing support from key shareholders such as SoftBank and Andreessen Horowitz. Full accounts will be released on Companies House.
In 2022, Improbable made clear its goal to become a major contender in the “metaverse” concept — virtual worlds in the digital space for people to do activities such as work, buy and sell things, and socialize.The firm partnered with Yuga Labs in order to develop Otherside, a metaverse where people can create digital avatars and take part in events.Additionally, Improbable penned a white paper introducing MSquared, a “network of interoperable Web3 metaverses”, which secured $150 million of investment in 2020.The highly complex program is designed to be accessed through cloud streaming, similar to how we currently watch movies and TV series on Netflix, with no prerequisite software downloads.This concept has aroused significant attention from names such as Major League Baseball (MLB), leading to a major contract for Improbable to construct a virtual ballpark with its metaverse technology. This virtual ballpark will give users control of which seat to watch a game from, and to zoom in on specific players. In recent years, the hype surrounding virtual and augmented reality has grown stronger, being referred to as the “iPhone moment” for its potential to be as revolutionary as the invention of the internet or smartphones. Apple, Meta, and Microsoft are all producing VR-compatible devices, while Improbable is taking an alternative approach as their software will be accessible through a computer, and content can be transferred across different metaverses.Founded in 2012 by Cambridge computer science students Narula and Rob Whitehead, Improbable has long been dedicated to creating worlds that can host thousands of people to play games and interact with one another. The UK-based company is one of Japanese technology powerhouse SoftBank’s top investments in Britain.
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