Jabali—an AI company advancing game engines and empowering visionary game designers and developers—announced it had raised a $5 million seed round led by BITKRAFT Ventures. Sapphire Sport, Sony Innovation Fund, Canonical Ventures, and angels from Amazon, Google AI, Open AI, and Pinterest also participated. The funding will be used to expand the Jabali team, sharpen proprietary models, and accelerate its product launch.
Jabali’s founding team comprises gaming executives from Amazon, Meta, Zynga, and Microsoft, along with leading AI researchers with extensive publications in prominent journals like AAAI and IEEE. Combined, the team has more than 50 years of gaming experience, and the games technology and games built by this team have been used by thousands of game developers and played by a billion players. Plus, Jabali is committed to transforming the processes and tools used to create games into something that anyone with a creative vision can use, removing major roadblocks like excessive coding or complicated workflows.
The company’s generative AI-powered game engine will enable users to create new types of games and interactive experiences without needing extensive game development knowledge. And Jabali is creating a purpose-built and closed-loop feedback workflow for video games and interactive experiences, utilizing the advances in multimodal generative AI.
KEY QUOTES:
“At Jabali, we believe that AI is the next chapter of innovation in video games. We need a revolutionary engine, built from the ground up incorporating advancements in generative AI. Our engine revisits what a game engine can do, enabling more people to make games and new experiences.”
- Jabali Founder and CEO, Vatsal Bhardwaj
“Today’s engines were built 25 years ago and we see an opportunity with Jabali to democratize game creation and drive innovation in today’s growing $200B+ gaming industry. With Vatsal’s experience in building games and games technology at Meta, Amazon and Zynga and Dr. Arnav Jhala’s extensive expertise in AI and video games research at NC State University and UC Santa Cruz, Jabali is poised to fundamentally change how developers make games and how gamers play them.”
- Scott Rupp, Partner at BITKRAFT Ventures
“Game engines are a critical driver to the expansion of creative capability and reach. Jabali is addressing fundamental shifts in game development requiring multi-modal generative AI technology to be built from the core of the game engine. This approach will not only supercharge game studios but also enhance game development and foster a new generation of game creators. AI is disruptive across almost all sectors and Jabali’s commitment, experience, and purpose-built application positions it as a leader in shaping the future of game creation.”
- Joseph Tou, Managing Director – U.S., Sony Ventures
