AI Tool Firm Xaitment Raises $3 Million

German AI tool provider Xaitment has raised €2.4 million ($3 million) in support of its aim to strengthen its presence in the global market. It'll apply the funds toward building up marketing, sales and support staff at its six offices worldwide, and invest the rest into bolstering its tools offering. This recent financing was provided by lead investor Triangle Venture Capital Group, with a second round of financing that closed in July providing an additional €1.3 million ($1.6 million) from Triangle and co-investor ERP Startfonds that closed in July, Xaitment says. The company credits its successful funding rounds to what it sees as the growing prevalence of middleware for AI in game development. The company offers a suite of middleware tools; companies use XaitMap and XaitMove tools to generate navigation meshes for AI pathfinding and control movement and crowd simulations, for example. The company's XaitControl is generally used to model character behaviors, and XaitKnow and XaitThink help developers plot and control NPC behavior. Xaitment tools are designed for next-gen platforms, including Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, Wii and Windows PC, the company adds. "AI middleware is an exciting topic of discussion in game development circles and has the most potential for growth," says group CEO Andreas Gerber. "With these strong partners at hand, we have the power to speed up our sales and development, and to guarantee our first-class, 24 hour support worldwide. We are looking confidently into the future knowing the huge potential our tools bring to game studios around the world."