CODE27, a California-based interactive character technology startup building immersive AI companion hardware, has raised over $10 million in seed and seed-extension financing as it advances its flagship device designed to bring anime and game characters into physical, real-world environments through holographic-style interaction systems and multimodal artificial intelligence.

The funding round was led by early-stage venture investors focused on consumer hardware and frontier AI applications, including firms such as Qiming Venture Partners, Sequoia China, Cornerstone Capital, and Gaohu Capital, according to disclosures associated with the company’s financing activity and early investor reporting. The participation of multiple global funds reflects growing investor interest in the intersection of artificial intelligence, entertainment IP, and dedicated consumer hardware platforms.

Founded in 2023, CODE27 is developing what it describes as an “interactive character companion system,” combining custom-designed desktop hardware with AI-driven conversational models, computer vision, and long-term memory architecture. The company’s core product allows users to interact with licensed or original digital characters through real-time voice dialogue, spatial display effects, and persistent behavioral memory that enables ongoing relationship-like engagement over time.

The startup has positioned itself within the rapidly growing “AI companion hardware” category, where companies are moving beyond software-only chatbot experiences toward dedicated physical devices that provide a more immersive and persistent presence. CODE27’s system is designed to simulate co-presence by integrating visual projection, environmental awareness, and emotional response modeling, allowing characters to react dynamically to user context and surroundings.

According to company materials and investor briefings, CODE27 has raised more than $10 million across consecutive seed and seed-extension rounds to accelerate engineering development, expand licensed intellectual property partnerships, and scale production of its flagship device. The company has also pursued collaborations with anime and gaming IP holders to integrate officially licensed character models and voice systems into its platform, aiming to differentiate through high-fidelity character experiences rather than generic AI avatars.

Early traction for CODE27 has been driven by strong consumer interest in interactive entertainment hardware. The company’s Kickstarter campaign raised over $1.9 million, while early retail deployments in Japan generated rapid sales momentum, including more than ¥85 million in first-day sales and over ¥140 million in cumulative sales across initial launch phases. These early signals have helped validate demand for physical AI companion systems beyond software-based applications.

The funding will be used to expand CODE27’s hardware production capabilities, improve multimodal AI performance, and build out a creator ecosystem that enables users to customize, extend, and co-create character experiences. The company is also investing in platform infrastructure that supports long-term memory systems, enabling characters to retain context across interactions and evolve behaviorally over time.

Investor participation from firms such as , , , and signals confidence in CODE27’s approach to blending hardware, AI, and entertainment IP into a unified consumer platform. Venture interest in this space has increased as advances in generative AI make real-time character interaction more sophisticated and commercially viable.

CODE27’s leadership team includes engineers and product executives with backgrounds in robotics, consumer electronics, and AI systems development. The company is currently operating across offices in Silicon Valley, Tokyo, and Shenzhen as it prepares for broader global expansion.

As the AI companion category continues to evolve, CODE27 is positioning itself at the intersection of entertainment, hardware computing, and artificial intelligence, aiming to redefine how users interact with digital characters through persistent, emotionally responsive, and physically present systems.

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