The company has attracted new investors.
After several branded keyboards for mobile devices, such as those for Hajduk Football Club or 2Cellos, Croatian startup Aspida has made a global breakthrough in cooperation with Rovio from Finland and has launched, under the Izzy brand, the first interactive keyboard for the fans of globally popular game and animated film “Angry Birds”, reports Jutarnji List on February 7, 2017.
Izzy ft. Angry Birds is the first keyboard with a finger gesture recognition which makes it possible to draw emoticons and symbols easily and quickly, without leaving the main keyboard and switching to a keyboard with symbols. So, in addition to standard functions and ways of entering symbols, it allows their entry with a swipe. Moreover, it provides additional experience through sounds and animations, so gestures for the ten most common emoticons also activate animations of characters. “The reaction of people when they saw it was ‘why has that not occurred to me’”, said Marin Erceg, the founder and CEO of Aspida.
The team from the Zagreb startup has worked on the design and development of the keyboard, in cooperation with their colleagues from Aspida Macedonia, a company which is being formally established at the moment. The first contact with Rovio was made a year ago and the cooperation agreement was signed in June last year.
As long as a year ago they developed code for a keyboard which implements the so-called gesture recognition. They used it, in addition to the Hajduk and 2Cellos keyboard, in joint projects with Croatian singers Nina Badrić and Massimo, Croatian Telecom and many other artists and sports clubs in Croatia and abroad. But, now they went a step further and added sounds and animations.
Erceg said that many have recognized the potential of their innovation and they have attracted new investors, although he did not want to reveal their names. Their currently sole investor is Jadran Kapital, which has invested 350,000 euros, while the Bruketa & Žinić OM agency is closely involved in the project and is responsible for digital marketing and communications. “The invested amount has been sufficient for us to do our job with dedication for more than two years, and it shows that the investor believes in us and our product”, said Erceg, adding that they would start the process of launching their project on the global level by the end of the month, which mostly depends on joint activities with Rovio.
As for the future plans, they suggests that they could expand their portfolio. “Let us just say that we are full of ideas which are not connected only with keyboards”, concluded Erceg.
