Meural is an American technology company whose principal product is the Meural Canvas, a digital connected canvas built to showcase artwork and photography—both Meural- and user-provided. Through end-to-end production—a combination of proprietary hardware,

software Software consists of computer programs that instruct the Execution (computing), execution of a computer. Software also includes design documents and specifications. The history of software is closely tied to the development of digital comput ...

, and

firmware In computing Computing is any goal-oriented activity requiring, benefiting from, or creating computer, computing machinery. It includes the study and experimentation of algorithmic processes, and the development of both computer hardware, h ...

—the digital frame is designed to look lifelike and textured.

History

Co-founders Vladimir Vukicevic and Jerry Hu, both first-generation immigrants, met at NYU at freshmen orientation. Prior to founding Meural, Vukicevic was co-founder and CTO at

RocketHub RocketHub was an online crowdfunding platform launched in 2010, its first use was September 1, 2009. Based in New York City, its users included musicians, entrepreneurs, scientists, game developers, philanthropists, filmmakers, photographers,Haine ...

, a leading

crowdfunding Crowdfunding is the practice of funding a project or venture by raising money from a large number of people, typically via the internet. Crowdfunding is a form of crowdsourcing and Alternative Finance, alternative finance, to fund projects "withou ...

platform acquired by eFactor. He also currently serves on the Board of Directors at

New York Foundation for the Arts The New York Foundation for the Arts (NYFA) is an independent 501(c)(3) charity, funded through government, foundation, corporate, and individual support, established in 1971. It is part of a network of national not-for-profit arts organizations ...

. Hu was a

product manager A product manager (PM) is a professional role that is responsible for the development of products for an organization, known as the practice of product management. Product managers own the product strategy behind a product (physical or digital), ...

FreshDirect FreshDirect is an American online grocery company and among the first enterprises to sell and deliver perishable foods to consumers without maintaining a retail operation. It offers its services via a website and mobile app. On December 15, 20 ...

, and has a background in art as a docent for the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco. In August 2014, Vukicevic and Hu founded Meural with the mission of facilitating art discovery and expression. The project was incubated out of Con Artist, an art collective, where they were able to get early feedback straight from artists. The first 12 months of the operation was dedicated to

research and development Research and development (R&D or R+D), known in some countries as OKB, experiment and design, is the set of innovative activities undertaken by corporations or governments in developing new services or products. R&D constitutes the first stage ...

, including: sourcing the LCD panel, developing the ambient light sensor brightness control, creating gesture control language, and designing the digital frames. The team sold out their first round of inventory in late 2015, and began their next batch in the summer of 2016. The startup behind the Meural art frame has been acquired by

Netgear Netgear, Inc. (stylized as NETGEAR in all caps), is an American computer networking company based in San Jose, California, with offices in about 22 other countries. It produces networking hardware for consumers, businesses, and service provide ...

. The deal was announced during the router company’s analyst day and was confirmed to

TechCrunch TechCrunch is an American global online newspaper focusing on topics regarding high tech, high-tech and Startup company, startup companies. It was founded in June 2005 by Archimedes Ventures, led by partners Michael Arrington and Keith Teare. I ...

by a Meural spokesperson. Terms of the deal were not disclose

Funding

Up until March 2016, Meural raised $695k from

angel investor An angel investor (also known as a business angel, informal investor, angel funder, private investor, or seed investor) is an individual who provides capital to a business or businesses, including startups, usually in exchange for convertible de ...

s and

venture capital Venture capital (VC) is a form of private equity financing provided by firms or funds to start-up company, startup, early-stage, and emerging companies, that have been deemed to have high growth potential or that have demonstrated high growth in ...

ists, including Bolt, Jeff Baltimore and Jerry Colonna. In a

seed round Seed money, also known as seed funding or seed capital, is a form of securities offering in which an investor puts capital in a startup company in exchange for an equity stake or convertible note stake in the company. The term ''seed'' suggest ...

ending April 2016, Meural raised $2.45 million, with investors including Corigin Ventures,

Barbara Corcoran Barbara Ann Corcoran (born March 10, 1949) is an American businesswoman, investor, syndicated columnist, and television personality. She founded The Corcoran Group, a real estate brokerage in New York City, which she sold to NRT for $66 million ...

Venture Partners, François-Henri Bennahmias of

Audemars Piguet Audemars Piguet Holding SA () is a Swiss manufacturer of luxury good, luxury watches, headquartered in Le Brassus, Switzerland. The company was founded by Jules Louis Audemars and Edward Auguste Piguet in the Vallée de Joux in 1875, acquiring ...

, Elio Leoni Sceti and Bolt.

Technology

The Meural Canvas employs an

in-plane switching IPS (in-plane switching) is a screen technology for liquid-crystal displays (LCDs). In IPS, a layer of liquid crystals is sandwiched between two glass surfaces. The liquid crystal molecules are aligned parallel to those surfaces in predetermined ...

display that renders over 16 million colors. It also has a low-reflective matte finish and an ambient light sensor for adaptive lighting. Besides the Meural app and my.meural.com, users can change the featured image with the swipe of their hand, using the gesture control feature.

Partnerships

To obtain their collection of work—which currently includes over 20,000 images—Meural partners with a variety of institutions, museums, and organizations. Current partners include Sedition, Bridgeman Images, Eyes on Walls, Lomography, 1000 Museums, Con Artist, and Galleray.

References

External links