Building the Future of Interactive Entertainment

Entertainment is changing. People don’t want more static content. They want experiences: interactive, always-on, and personalized.

Yet, the technology to support this doesn’t exist. With all the advancements in generative AI, no one has been able to create unscripted, human-like avatars that respond to users in real-time.

At ValkaAI, we’re on a mission to fill that gap by building virtual beings that can respond with the spontaneity and natural movement of a human.

This type of work involves synchronization across voice, motion, cognition, and infrastructure. It’s not easy. And it’s not cheap.

That’s why we’re thrilled about our first external capital—€12M pre-seed funding, led by Rockaway Ventures, with participation from J&T Ventures, Tensor Ventures, BD Partners, Fond Naše Česko and Petr Zámečník.

From the outset, ValkaAI has been an international project, with teams spread across the United States, Europe, and UAE, with the goal of building a world leader in AI video from the Czech Republic. We believe this funding, one of the most significant pre-seed rounds in EEU, will serve as a sign of the great potential of startups in CZ and across Europe.

Advancing Entertainment Through GenAI

We believe video is ceasing to function as a finished product. The next phase will be an interface that users can interact with, adapt to context, and use to engage with each individual viewer—and that future is upon us.

“Today’s experience is still largely linear – you just hit play and watch. We believe the next step is real-time environments users can step into, where content is no longer just consumed but actively shaped,“ says Vlastimil Venclík, co-founder and CEO of ValkaAI.

“ValkaAI is tackling a difficult but fundamental challenge – combining visual quality with speed and true real-time interactivity. This is not just another application. It provides the foundation for a new generation of entertainment,” says Petr Šmíd, General Partner at Rockaway Ventures, progressive part of the newly established Rockaway Fund within Rockaway Capital.

In e-sports, this technology could take the form of an AI commentator that reacts to in-game action in real time, speaks the viewer’s language, and adapts to their viewing style. The same principle can be applied to digital characters and virtual environments that dynamically evolve based on user behavior.

“Our technology opens the door to an entirely new range of applications – from interactive sports simulations to live broadcasts that are localized, personalized, and responsive to specific audiences in real time,” says Miloš Lokajíček, co-founder and COO of ValkaAI.

Our unique three-tiered genAI process will be able to create the technology for on-demand content at scale and without the technical limitations we currently see with AI-generated video: flickering, deformation, or visual breakdown.

This funding round not only validates the importance of the work but will also go towards strengthening the research and product teams, advancing core technologies for real-time digital characters and AI commentators, and supporting the first commercial implementations.