Niantic, Inc.

Niantic, Inc. (naɪ'æntɪk ) is an American software development company based in San Francisco. Niantic is best known for developing the augmented reality mobile games Ingress and Pokémon Go. The company was formed as Niantic Labs in 2010 as an internal startup within Google. The company became an independent entity in October 2015 when Google restructured under Alphabet Inc. Niantic has additional offices in Bellevue, Los Angeles, Sunnyvale, Seattle, Lawrence, Los Angeles, Tokyo, London, Hamburg, and Zurich. The company was formed in 2010 by John Hanke as Niantic Labs, an internal startup within Google. The company took its name from the whaling vessel Niantic, which came to San Francisco during the California Gold Rush in the 1800s. At the time Ingress was launched, Niantic had 35 employees. The company spun out of Google in October 2015 soon after Google's announcement of its restructuring as Alphabet Inc. During the spinout, Niantic announced that Google, Nintendo, and The Pokémon Company would invest up to $30 million in Series-A funding,$20 million upfront and the remaining $10 million in financing conditioned upon the company achieving certain milestones, to support the growth of the company and its products. In February 2016, Niantic announced that it had secured an additional$5 million in Series A funding including investment from venture capital firms Alsop Louie Partners and You & Mr. Jones Brandtech Ventures, as well as angel investors Lucas Nealan, Cyan Banister, and Scott Banister. While adding more support for the growth of the company, this investment enabled Niantic to bring in strategic industry pioneers including the addition of Gilman Louie to its board. In November 2017, Niantic raised $200 million in Series B funding from multiple investors, led by Spark Capital. Spark's Megan Quinn joined Niantic's board of directors during this investment round. In January 2019, it was reported that Niantic had raised an additional$245 million in a Series C fundraising round.