$10 million funding round<\/a>, San Francisco-based Hedra, a web-based AI animation and video generator, revealed that it has raised $32 million in Series A Funding. <\/p>\nThe latest round, which increases Hedra\u2019s total funding to $44 million since last year, was led by Andreessen Horowitz\u2019s Infrastructure fund (a16z Infra), with participation from existing investors, including A16z Speedrun, Abstract, and Index Ventures. Amazon\u2019s Alexa Fund is also a backer. Per Reuters,<\/em> after this latest funding round, the company is valued around $200 million.<\/p>\nHere is more about Hedra\u2019s business:<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n<\/p>\n![\"Michael](\"https:\/\/www.cartoonbrew.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/michaellingelbach.jpg\")
Hedra founder Michael Lingelbach.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n- Hedra was founded by Michael Lingelbach, who is also CEO. His bio says that he is a former stage actor, an experience that has shaped his belief that characters are at the heart of every story: \u201cWe\u2019re building the next generation of storytelling technology to empower content creators and enterprise marketers to tell narratives at scale on their own. Getting over the uncanny valley of compelling performance is the hardest frontier in video, and with our Character-3 foundation model, we\u2019re devoted to crossing it.\u201d<\/li>\n
- Hedra\u2019s Character-3 claims to be the first omnimodal foundation model that blends text, image, and audio to create \u201chighly controllable, expressive\u201d character performance videos. The company differentiates its product from other AI video generators by promoting a \u201cunified solution that integrates story, sound, and video generation\u201d into a single workflow. Lingelbach told Techcrunch<\/em> that he wanted Hedra to be a product \u201cat the intersection of video generation and 3d characters, with long dialogues and better controllability.\u201d<\/li>\n
- Hedra currently employs 20 people and plans to triple its headcount to 60 by the end the 2025. Besides additional hiring, the company will use the new funding to train its next model that will offer enhanced customization features. It also plans to develop new tech that allows interactive experiences between users and AI-generated characters.<\/li>\n
- Hedra\u2019s model has had increased visibility in recent weeks because of the \u201cbaby AI\u201d trend in which adults are reimagined as animated babies (example below):<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
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