Most startups don’t get a Series B funding round anywhere near $542 million, but Dania Beach, Florida based Magic Leap just announced that today.

The company has been in a sort of stealthmode since it was founded in 2011. In their first round of funding, the company obtained $50 million in funding and has now secured a second round of $542 million. Since the first round of funding, however, the company has moved from Hollywood, Florida to Dania Beach, Florida just up the Florida coast. Very little is publicly known about the company, but they definitely like to sell themselves as surrealists and people with abstract ideas as displayed by their 2013 TEDxSarasota performance/talk that they gave.

There’s no denying that these guys are unique and special, but the question is really whether or not their AR or VR stuff is really up to snuff. There’s no denying that this $542 milllion round in funding is coming primarily from Google and Qualcomm because both companies have expressed extreme interest in both VR and AR and they’ve been starving for a company to invest in that isn’t Oculus. Once Oculus got snapped up by Facebook, a lot of companies got turned off to Oculus, even though Oculus is still a great product and platform.

Many companies have tried to capitalize around the excitement around VR and AR, but none of them have come anywhere near as close as Oculus with a final product. The interesting part is that this new $542 million Series B funding round is very likely going to propel Magic Leap into their public phase where they can finally announce what they’re actually doing and show it to the public. If they’ve convinced Google, Qualcomm, Legendary Entertainment, KKR, Vulcan Capital, Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Bryers, Andreeson Horowitz, Obvious Ventires and many others, then they clearly have something good. In addition, Google’s Sundar Pichai, SVP of Android, Chrome and Apps will join the company’s board off directors, indicating that Google is taking a leading role in this funding round. Magic Leap also named Dr. Paul Jacobs former CEO of Qualcomm and Don Harrison, VP of Corporate Development at Google as members of the board of directors at Magic Leak as ‘observers’ whatever the heck that’s supposed to mean.

Magic Leap is finally serious business, and they’ve managed to raise over half a billion dollars from some of the most powerful companies and venture capital firms in the world, so they’ve got some of the most critical people convinced, now we just need to see what they’re actually going to do. The mention of Legendary Entertainment is an interesting one as well, because the company actually used Oculus VR headsets at their booth this year at Comicon, so they are clearly and completely on the VR train. In fact, they have the Interstellar experience that is designed to promote the new film coming out which also utilizes Oculus VR headsets to create a more immersive experience. After all, Legendary wants to have a leg up on all of their competitors if they can make a more immersive entertainment experience.

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We’ve been asking around, trying to figure out what will be going on on and off site this year and we’ve been sure to hit up all of the usual suspects in terms of gaming and hardware companies to see what they’ll be doing at Comic-Con this year. This year, Legendary will be having a pretty major focus on World of Warcraft, as they’ll be having a signing with the upcoming movie’s director, Duncan Jones. The signing will occur at 2pm on Saturday (likely immediately following their Hall H panel) and in order to get a poster and in line for the signing you need to stand in line at 11am at Blizzard’s booth (NOT Legendary’s) to get ‘tickets’. So, if you want to see the panel you won’t be able to get a signing from the director, which is kind of lame.

Legendary Booth
Booth Location: #3920

legendary booth SDCC

Legendary will also have a film panel in Hall H on Saturday, where I believe we’ll definitely see some serious World of Warcraft footage as well as some other films they’re working on. That will be on Saturday at 12:35. During the panel, Legendary will be live tweeting from Hall H at @Legendary.

Blizzard will also have a booth at Comic-Con, however their booth will mostly be for merchandise (Booth# 115) and the Director’s signing.

We’ve also caught wind of two laser tagging events that will be going on during Comic-Con, one is being put on by Nerdist Industries in partnership with 2K games (and Gearbox) and the other is by Comedy Central. The one being put on by Nerdist Industries (which we’ll be attending) is to promote the new game by 2K games and Gearbox, Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel. The event itself is open to the public and will be held at Petco Park from Thursday July 24th through Saturday July 26th at from 11am to 5pm. Priority will go to San Diego Comic Con (SDCC) badge holders, however everyone will be able to play as there will be two teams of 25 playing for a short period of time. There will also be special guests like Chris Hardwick, Gearbox president Randy Pitchford as well as prizes for Borderlands cosplayers and much much more.

The Comedy Central laser tag event (funny that there are two this year) will be to promote their new show Moonbeam City. This event will also be open to the public (and off-site) and will be located at The San Diego Wine & Culinary Center and will also include the Comedy Central GIF booth, Giveaways and more, running from Friday July 25th through Saturday July 26th from 11am to 8pm.

San Diego International Comic-Con

We also spoke with Intel to see what they’ll be doing at Comic-Con this year and they’re sponsoring a lot of various events and giveaways throughout the course of Comic-Con.

Intel is a sponsor of the 2014 Nerd HQ at San Diego Comic-Con. In the booth, Intel will feature tablets, 2-in-1s, PAIOs and the “Created by You and Intel” photo app. In addition to the photo app in the booth, Intel will be mobile with tablets and a never-been-done-before portable green screen to connect with additional Comic-Con fans.  Intel will also be prizing 1 Xidax gaming tower & peripherals ($1,523), 20 Core i7 Extreme processors ($1,000 each), and 4 Acer Iconia A1-830 tablets ($160 each). They are also providing 80+ Intel-based tablets, 2-in-1s, and PAIOs for Intel as well as for many of the exhibitors at Nerd HQ.

Intel is also the sponsor of the Nerd HQ and Operation Smiles “Smiles for Smiles” photo booth – featuring 2-in-1s for photo sharing. YouTube personality iJustine will be supporting onsite and via social with a photo-based Instagram contest.  Intel will also be providing 8 Core i7 Extreme processors to Makers for onsite co-marketing promotions and the same to Nerd HQ. They will also be running a retail offer with Newegg to give out coupons for $25 off Acer tablets.

Unfortunately, AMD and Nvidia will not have any presence this year at Comic-Con, so the amount of hardware that’ll be given out will likely be much less than last year. After all, a few years ago AMD gave out hundreds of APUs.

Microsoft will be attending again this year, as will Sony, however Microsoft will have both an Xbox booth and an Xbox lounge with tons of Surface Pro 3’s and Xbox Ones for relaxing and gaming.

It should be an interesting Comic-Con this year and we’ll do our best to report on what we find interesting and of course post pictures of all the cosplayers.

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