Meez to Sell Custom 3D Avatars

Posted on March 29, 2006

Forbes has a story about a company named Meez that has an interesting business model: selling 3D avatars and avatar outfits. Meez has already raised over $4 million dollars.

Meez is currently a free, Web-based service that offers thousands of facial and costume combinations, but Ryan plans to make money by offering users the chance to let their pixilated doppelgangers wear licensed brands, like Major League Baseball and National Hockey League jerseys, and premium clothing designs for a fee. Pricing should run parallel to the $1.50 to $2.50 price range that ringtones and wallpapers go for, he says.
Is there a market for this stuff? Maybe. Some 68 million people use instant-messaging services like Yahoo!, Google and Time Warner's AOL, and 60% of teenage instant-messenger users download free icons to represent themselves when they chat, according to the Pew Internet and American Life Project.
And some competitors are already aiming at the same business. Yahoo! has offered up free avatars for almost two years, but the caricatures can't be personalized as extensively, and the pictures can only be used within the Yahoo! network. Palo Alto, Calif.-based chat startup IMVU also offers avatars, but the 3D images can't be used on other instant-messaging systems.
Meanwhile, Comverse Technology has announced an avatar service called "Klonies," designed solely for mobile services, but the product has yet to launch in the U.S. Ryan says Meez doesn't yet let users move the images to their phones but will eventually.

Klonies is unlikely to be the only competition Meez faces. With its early start, Meez has the opportunity to get a big jump on Klonies and any future 3D personalized avatar competitors. The coverage in Forbes will also help Meez. You can read more about Meez in their press release.