by Facebook and Instagram owner Meta has bought Audio Analytic, a Cambridge-based startup that develops AI-powered sound recognition software.
Founded in 2010 by Chris Mitchell, Audio Analytic aims to augment consumer technology with high-end sound recognition and has trained its AI to recognize a wide range of sounds, including smoke alarms, barking dogs, windows or even crying babies.
According to the company’s website, its technology can give machines the “most accurate, robust and compact sense of hearing on the planet.”
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Audio Analytic, the Telegraph reports, will join Meta’s Reality Labs division that handles the development of AR and VR technology. This is all part of Zuckerberg’s plan to make the metaverse the “future of the Internet.”
Specifically, the startup will come under the division’s audio research department, which focuses on making virtual sounds and speech more realistic.
There’s no question Zuckerberg hopes Audio Analytic will help support Meta’s hitherto unprofitable pivot into the world of virtual reality. For reference, the company’s Reality Labs division lost $3.7 billion in the third quarter of 2022, which followed a $2.8 billion loss in the second quarter. What’s more, the company anticipates more losses next year.
According to Meta’s Third Quarter Report, “We anticipate Reality Labs operating losses in 2023 to grow significantly year over year.”
Silicon Valley continues to devour European startups
This is not the first time that Meta has turned to European startups to help it create and dominate the metaverse space.
In the summer of 2022, the tech giant acquired Berlin-based Lofelt, which specializes in haptic technology, specifically wearable devices that can help people experience the virtual world around them. In other words, exactly the kind of technology needed to enhance our experience of the metaverse.
While in 2020, Meta (then Facebook) acquired Scape Technologies, a company with experience in mapping for augmented reality.
And as far as Europe-based audio startups go, Audio Analytic isn’t the only one that’s been snapped up by big tech companies.
In 2012, Amazon bought Evi, which developed the voice assistant technology that became part of Amazon’s Alexa. Apple has acquired voice-recognition company VocalIQ as well as imaging startup Spectral Edge to help improve the iPhone’s camera.
There is a long history of US companies acquiring European startups before the latter can grow adequately. Some of this is obviously to be expected (few of us would turn down millions of euros and the opportunity to scale), but it could be worrying that there are so few big tech players on the continent.
So the question is whether the EU should get involved in funding prominent startups to become unicorns, rather than letting the Silicon Valley giants take them away. And until there is a solid answer to that question, we will see this pattern keep repeating itself.
