Case Study - Animation Toolkit

Wes was seeking funding/finance and was referred to me from Access to Finance (A2F).

At my first initial meeting with Wes, we did a diagnostic and discussed the challenges he was facing. We identified key areas to work on, increasing sales, manufacturing, and discussed potential new ideas and the Intellectual Property to be assessed, along with raising finance to scale the business and to grow his idea for a new brand called Anibild.

I introduced the opportunity of the Innovate UK Creative Catalyst Grant up to £50,000 which would allow some R&D, to explore the proof of concept for Anibild and make some prototypes.

As his Innovation & Growth Specialist, I assisted Wes to hone his idea and advised on the application. Wes was successful in securing £50,000.

The new project will introduce a completely new revenue stream to their business through their introduction of model kits in armature form to industry standard, made up of metal parts and 3D printed plastics parts e.g. the heads and hands, for the home enthusiast. Combined with an Augmented Reality (AR) platform the customers can upload the character they build onto the platform to give it different colour skin or features, customise it,  and bring it to life.

This is an industry first for stock motion animation and the collectors market. It generates new Intellectual Property for the company, and we have advised how to protect their ideas and products and to utilise the services of an IP Lawyer.

Wes and his team have developed a library of movements over the years which they can now monetise and include in this new platform, which the customer can purchase on a subscription basis to bring more life to their character e.g. walking, jumping, and even a hip hop dance.

These new products are in kit form and appeal to both the collector and the professional. The first Anibild model is a Humanoid with articulated joints. There are other designs in the pipeline about to launch too.

There will be a subscription-based model for fans who purchase the products and they will be able to upload, customise and access more complicated moves for their Anibuild Humanoid, as well as learning about stock motion animation in addition to their YouTube Channel.

We identified Intellectual property to protect the Anibild brand of products through a trademark and to look at how we can generate licensing from IP over the next few years.

Some of the metal components are manufactured in China but deliveries are challenging as is quality control. Wes and I discussed looking to manufacture in-house the plastic attachments of the head, hands and other parts. Wes acquired a 3D printer to enable in-house manufacturing and has now taken on two new staff.

More funds were required to pivot the company and I invited Wes to apply for the Innovate UK Invest-a-bility Pathway programme in 2024. He was successful in securing a place and learned how to build his pitch deck and build confidence in presenting and pitching to investors going forward in order to grow and scale the company internationally.

Wes is now meeting with investors to raise £1M, has growth his team and the products will be available to pre order now before launch in July 2024.

Visit the website to learn more about Animation Toolkit.