We invest in Amazing Humans -- and we want to share their stories, insights, knowledge, and all-around awesomeness. As builders and leaders, they work tirelessly towards their vision of the future they want to realize. Our founders make science fiction a reality, and we want to show off their superpowers!

Meet Chen Zhang, CEO & Co-Founder of Aquifer, a platform for teams and creators to make stunning animated videos and live-streams with their brand's IP in minutes -- No experience required.

Boost VC is a proud investor, alongside LDV Capital, Geekdom Fund, Wedbush Ventures, Techstars, First Row Partners, Capital Factory, Gurtin Ventures, and strategic angels. We are excited to support Chen & Matt in their recent $2M seed round as they grow Aquifer to empower more teams to tell 3D visual stories, unencumbered by lack of technical expertise, time, or budget.

Aquifer is actively hiring! Check out open roles here: https://www.aquifermotion.com/jobs

Chen, let’s dive right in. What is the genesis story of Aquifer? How did you and Matt decide to start this company?

Matt and I have very different backgrounds. He came from AAA video games and immersive entertainment. I have a digital product, UX, and brand background. We found a shared love for immersive storytelling and co-founded our AR, VR, and 3D immersive story studio based in Austin, Texas. We created immersive experiences for clients like Adidas and Merck and it was at that studio where Matt built the first version of Aquifer as an internal tool. The tool made such an impact in our studio, enabling non-technical folks who want to tell stories, but who have no modeling, texturing, animation skills to create 3D animated content, that he and I realized the bigger potential was to put it directly into the hands of brands and teams. We raised some friends and family and angel money, were accepted into the Techstars Austin ‘20 cohort and Aquifer was born.

Who is seeing the most value using Aquifer today? (Identify Target customer - role, responsibility, industry, etc)

Our customers are brands and marketing teams who need cinematic video to inform, educate, entertain, and convert their audiences. Our customers include Crunchyroll, G2 Esports, Infinite World, and others.

The media landscape is more fragmented than ever. Brands and marketing content teams have to create for YouTube, TikTok, web, Instagram, and many other platforms to engage their audiences. The content also has to be unique and on-brand.

3D animation is the most flexible storytelling medium out there, it can be realistic or stylized. You can depict otherworldly scenes or recreate reality shot for shot. It’s such a powerful medium for brands and marketing, but it’s very expensive and requires lengthy productions. Aquifer solves for that by allowing anyone to create custom 3D animated videos in minutes, no experience needed!

How has storytelling changed within the current wave of “creator economy”? How are brands adapting to fit these new norms, attention spans, non-traditional media outlets?

It’s a challenging time for brands. There are more platforms, media types, and opportunities than ever, but they have a hard job prioritizing platforms and keeping up with the content demands. Consumers’ attention spans are shorter and we largely have stopped reading. 72% of consumers prefer learning about products by video. Video is also the most time consuming media type to create.

Now brands have even less time to capture consumer’s attention amidst the wave of other options they have for entertainment or information.

They’re all adapting in different ways, some better than others. We’re seeing brands test a lot of things, like NFT drops, to being on TikTok, to brand mascots, to metaverse, to live streaming. None of them seem to have solid plans and it’s all about whether these opportunities drive actual goals, from brand growth to sales. It’s an exciting time and I predict the media landscape will only get more complicated as we progress. Lots of great innovation ahead!

As a founder, what is the biggest leadership lesson you’ve learned since starting Aquifer?

Definitely that the transition from being the do-er to a manager is a big foundational shift. When you’re starting a company, you do EVERYTHING. Then you hire your first few employees, likely engineers and you grow furiously. At that point, you’re still doing everything hands on and selling your vision. Then you grow a bit more and the conversations with the team become more long term - about the company’s trajectory, roles and responsibilities - and you formalize processes more. You learn about setting OKRs and managing a sales team and creating commission plans. In a short period of time, you redefine the co-founder and CEO role over and over again, and learn a ton about yourself in the process.

What are the 3 things that most excite you about the creator economy right now?

The explosion of storytelling format - There has never been this many ways to tell stories, from VR, to AR, live-streaming, episodic, hyper short-form, audio only, animated, live-action etc.
Content ownership and attribution - The blockchain is enabling amazing opportunities for creators to own their digital content
Creator monetization - from live-stream gifts to merch to shoppable posts, there are so many exciting ways for creators to make income now. This enriches and grows the creator economy and ecosystem overall.

Is there a particular book, film, or podcast that made a significant impact on you? Can you share a story or explain why it resonated with you so much?

A current favorite podcast of mine is Feeling Asian. It features two Asian American creators and entrepreneurs from NYC who invite prominent Asian creators, comedians, entrepreneurs to talk about their feelings, work, and lives. I started listening to it when racism against Asians and Pacific Islanders rose after the start of the pandemic. It gave me a sense of community and support during a difficult time. Hearing leaders in their field talk openly about themselves and their careers also brought a lot of perspective into how my culture plays into my roles as leader, manager, co-founder, and entrepreneur and my relationship to work. For example, I have extremely high expectations of myself and my team. Learning about that and how it affects me and the people I work with every day has made me better. I now know to take a breath and celebrate small wins on the path to bigger wins. You also hear so much “Inside Baseball” about the creator economy, finding success on social media, and how they stay creative amid pressure. Highly recommend it to everyone, whether you’re Asian or not!

Any advice for future founders who want to take a leap and start a company?

Learn about your market. Talk to prospective customers as much as possible. Ask open ended questions and listen to everything they say, even the stuff that is difficult to hear. It’ll make your company and product so much stronger.

What is the best way to learn more about Aquifer or get started using your platform?

Schedule a live demo! It’s the best way to see the platform in action and how simple it is to create stunning 3D animated content. Go to www.aquifermotion.com to check out features and read case studies. You can find a time for a demo right on our website.

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Boost VC is the $500k Accelerator for Sci-Fi, co-founded by Adam Draper and Brayton Williams in San Mateo, CA. We invest at the intersection of Amazing Humans, Sci-Fi Tech and Trillion Dollar Markets. Learn more: www.boost.vc

Chen Zhang, CEO & Co-Founder of Aquifer