London-based Emperia has raised $10 million.
Concept Ventures are pleased to share that Concept portfolio company Emperia has raised a $10 million Series A investment round “led by Base10 Partners, joined by Concept Ventures, Daphni, Sony Ventures, Background Capital, Bliss Growth & Stanford Capital Partners to help equip luxury brands worldwide with unique virtual spaces & experiences for their customers.”
When Concept Ventures initially invested in 2020, Olga & Simonas shared a compelling story and vision “for the future of online luxury brands, and they’ve certainly delivered to date.”
Emperia has now partnered “with some of the world’s leading brands; from Lacoste to Dior, and Ralph Lauren to PSG, their hotly demanded platform and product suite have consistently shown increased sales, deeper customer engagement and more robust virtual brand perception, something we witnessed very early on in the companies lifecycle.”
Their offering has “helped brands including Dior, Bloomingdale’s, Burberry, Lacoste, Christie’s, Sunglass Hut, Getty Images, and undisclosed ‘others’, drive increased conversion rates by an average of 73 percent (when compared to traditional e-commerce websites) since opening its doors in 2019, resulting in an average ROI of 750 percent.”
Emperia CEO and co-founder Olga Dogakina, whose career spans time with brands including Michael Kors, and Coach, elaborates:
“We are strong believers in data reliance and as such all our virtual experiences are developed incorporating analytics, which is reflected in layout, design, user experience, and merchandise placement. Crucially, we’re doing this in a way that has a demonstrable impact on sales, traffic, engagement, and brand perception.”
The team noted that they can’t wait “to see this incredible business grow from strength to strength and will continue to support Olga and Simonas as they change luxury retail for the better.”
Emperia develops immersive virtual stores “for the fashion and retail sectors, boosting sales, customer engagement and brand perception.”
They are building e-commerce’s new technology frontier, highly-differentiated virtual experiences that “extend brands’ physical spaces into the virtual realm and the metaverse, adding a layer of interaction, personalization, data monitoring, and omni channel cohesion.”
London and New York-based, the Emperia team “consists of 3D environment engineers and technical artists joined by fashion and art industry veterans and branding experts.”
Hailed a virtual reality pioneer by Forbes Magazine, Emperia is working “with some of the world’s leading names in art, fashion and retail including Dior, Burberry, Bloomingdale’s, Harrods, Giorgio Armani, Lacoste, Dom Pérignon, Christie’s, Getty Images and more.”