Meet new people from around the world and chat with them.What are your thoughts on this subject? What are the main activities of users in IMVU?Ĭary: First, IMVU is not a Virtual World – IMVU is a Social Entertainment destination that provides our members with a number of entertainment options including the ability to: When we reached a point where we’ve achieved the quality of service that we expected, and that our members expected, we then removed the beta label.ĭFC: What is the core attraction of 3D virtual worlds to consumers? What makes a social network with 3D avatars different from Facebook? What makes IMVU different from Second Life? One comment we have heard from users of is simply not much to do. Previously we had maintained the Beta label because we hold IMVU up to a very high standard. Why so long?Ĭary: IMVU has recently removed the Beta label. The company currently has almost 100 employees.ĭFC: IMVU has been in open beta since April 2004. Another 10% of the company’s revenue comes from its users buying premium memberships and another 15% from advertising. Seventy-five percent of IMVU’s revenue comes from the sale of credits that members use to purchase virtual goods to outfit their avatar or create virtual spaces. Founded in 2004, IMVU is backed by venture investors Menlo Ventures, Allegis Capital, Bridgescale Partners and Best Buy Capital, and is located in Palo Alto, CA. IMVU has reached 50 million registered users, 10plus million unique visitors per month and a $40 million annualized revenue run of more than 4 million items, almost all of which are created by its own members.
What are your primary product categories and revenue generators? How many employees do you have? How many users do you have?Ĭary: IMVU, Inc. is an online community where members use 3D avatars to meet new people, chat, create and play with their friends. Since many in the game industry are unaware of IMVU or its continuing growth, DFC went to chief executive Cary Rosenzweig to learn more about the service and why consumers are attracted to IMVU.ĭFC: So give us the big picture overview of IMVU. The goal is to go away from the concept of a “virtual world” to the idea of being a social entertainment platform. IMVU is starting with about 75 games from Viximo, Heyzap and OMGPOP. The idea is IMVU will be able to leverage its social network and virtual goods economy to offer many of the games that are now popular on casual game portals and social network sites like Facebook. To address this issue, in September 2010, IMVU announced that it was going to add a selection of games to its virtual world. One of the big complaints facing many pure virtual worlds, is the lack of things to do beyond chatting with others. By April 2010, it was announced the virtual world had reached a $40 million annualized revenue run rate. In October 2009, it was announced that IMVU was doing a $25 million annual revenue run rate. Therefore it comes as somewhat of a surprise that IMVU is the exception to the rule. In early 2010, Makena Technologies closed down the long running virtual world. The most notable virtual world, Linden Labs Second Life, has been on the decline and is subject to a major class action lawsuit. In the past two years, most of the news around the space has not been positive. Naturally, users outfitting their rooms will also go to visit the virtual item catalog.Īround 2007, 3D virtual worlds were seen as all the rage. As the emphasis is on voice and text chat, IMVU is designed around private rooms were avatars go to meet, not an expansive virtual world. What’s more, the source of those items are registered user/programmers.
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IMVU is free to play, but the those who decide to stick around usually avail themselves of the 4 million virtual items for sale in IMVU’s catalog. In many ways the concept reads like The Sims Online stripped of the simulation gameplay elements, in favor of a doubling down on user-generated content and player interaction. Since 2004 the service has been perfecting a 3D virtual environment where users deck out their avatars in the fashion style of their choice, and go out to chat with the people they meet.
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