The UK’s eight immersive studios to watch

With ten years of experience accelerating the adoption of deep tech across the UK’s creative industries, Digital Catapult has long championed the role of startups in the immersive sector. Much has changed in the immersive space since our initial CreativeXR accelerator launched in 2017 to enable UK creative teams to experiment, iterate and bring immersive project ideas to reality.

As immersive content and experiences gain more traction in business and in wider society, and the technology itself continues to evolve, we have selected the eight UK immersive studios creating the most innovative content and experiences from our alumni network.

From creating groundbreaking augmented reality (AR) experiences and producing interactive virtual reality (VR) narratives, to working with international collaborators and showcasing their work at internationally recognised film festivals, here are the UK’s eight immersive studios to watch:

BetaJester

BetaJester is an immersive experiences studio specialising in building games for console, mobile, virtual reality, and augmented reality. Working with visionaries from all sectors, its team are experts in realising otherworldly experiences.  The studios’ recent work includes creating content for the wildly successful console game ‘Aerial_Knight’s Never Yield’; exploring Britain’s past with its own VR comedy-horror title ‘The Burning Room’, and combining modern technology with archaeological evidence to explore Hull in the 1600s with ‘By the Rising Tide of the Humber’.

Neurotech

Neurotech is a startup that brings solutions from engineering and high-tech industries to the fields of education and medicine. It develops augmented and mixed reality games for children aged 7-10 years old and has two flagship products: TalkbackVR, an educational tool for the classroom and home aimed at improving literacy and SeeForMyself, a multi-platform app encompassing mobile devices and VR headsets to help neurodiverse students access careers information, find a career they enjoy and experience a taste of that career in VR. Both of these products were designed for, and in collaboration with, neurodiverse students and are now in use in schools across the UK.

Echobubbles

Echobubbles was founded in 2021 in response to COVID-19’s impact on the physical experiences and events industry. It builds online, bespoke worlds to create interactive and immersive experiences for individuals and companies who want to explore, play, socialise and learn. The company is currently supported by Cambridge Judge Business School, as a registered social venture committed to lowering carbon emissions through its productions.

Peel X

Peel X is an award-winning XR studio. It brings the real and the virtual worlds together to seamlessly deliver unforgettable immersive experiences across tourism, retail, education, culture and the arts. Over the past decade, Peel X has grown into a visionary team at the forefront of digital storytelling, with a diverse portfolio of work that has achieved accolades including Visit England’s ‘Best Told Story’ Award, and includes groundbreaking projects like Uist Unearthed – the first AR trail app to deliver archaeological storytelling – which was recently featured in the British Museum.

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