Infinite Reality Acquires AI Company Touchcast for $500M

Hot on the heels of its jaw-dropping $207 million Napster acquisition, Infinite Reality has announced the acquisition of AI company Touchcast for $500 million (i.e., half-a-billion dollars) in a combination of cash and stock.

The acquisition is Infinite Reality’s largest yet, and the transaction agreement technically values the company at $15.5 billion. Touchcast’s agentic AI platform, known as Mentorverse, generates AI ‘mentors’ who engage in face-to-face video conversations.

Unlike traditional chatbots or static web experiences, they also combine consistent personalities with domain expertise to deliver guidance through multimodal interactions — according to the pitch.

Sounds interesting, though is that worth $500 million, i.e., half-a-billion bucks? Multiple music industry execs are still puzzled at why Napster fetched $207 million from Infinite Reality, particularly given the platform’s scant subscriber base, unpaid royalties, and waning brand equity — among other issues.

According to the latest acquisition description, the integration of Touchcast’s technology across Infinite Reality’s portfolio of products and services will enable customers to tap AI agents for a number of tasks that drive user engagement, customer support, and sales.

For example, within Napster, Touchcast tech could enable subscribers to generate immersive social listening spaces and leverage AI agents for music playlisting, community management, and music trivia, among other engaging features.

Meanwhile, Touchcast says it’s built on OpenAI and delivered on Microsoft Azure via a $50 million strategic partnership that provides a suite of AI delivery systems to improve response times.

Touchcast says its platform is turning what once required entire teams and years of work into one-click solutions with multiple products ranging from AI mentors to transforming websites into interactive AI experiences and more. The company holds 27 patents related to AI and interactive video technology, including systems for coordinated presentations, video conferencing enhancements, and intelligent virtual assistant systems.

“The acquisition of Touchcast marks our largest transaction thus far, and represents a perfect continuation of our strategic growth trajectory, building on the momentum from the iconic Napster acquisition and recent $3 billion funding round,” says Amish Shah, Co-Founder and Chief Business Officer, Infinite Reality.

“The addition of Touchcast’s agentic AI technology serves as a powerful building block for our platform as we look to provide our customers with the tools they need to succeed in the modern AI-powered era.”