Mirror founder’s new game startup Board raises $20M, sells thousands

Board, a New York-based startup focused on what it calls “together tech,” has raised $20 million in Series A funding led by Union Square Ventures. The company, now three years old, builds technology designed to bring people together in the same physical space.

Union Square Ventures General Partner Michael Mignano is making his first investment since joining the firm and will take a seat on Board’s board of directors. The round also attracted notable angel investors including Biz Stone, Tim Ferriss, and Scott Belsky.

The funding arrives roughly eight months after founder Brynn Putnam publicly unveiled Board at TechCrunch Disrupt last October. Putnam previously sold her connected fitness startup Mirror to Lululemon for $500 million.

Board’s flagship device is a 24-inch touchscreen housed in a wood-finish frame. It uses proprietary technology to recognize physical game pieces, blending the tactile feel of traditional board games with the interactivity of video games.

Traction since the launch has been impressive. The company reports that Board is now in tens of thousands of homes, schools, hospitals, and restaurants across all 50 states. Notably, 85% of customers average 30 or more play sessions per month.

Alongside the funding, Board announced Board Studio, an AI-powered creation platform set to launch later this year. The platform will allow anyone to build original games using natural language prompts, turning an idea into a playable prototype in under an hour.

Board had previously raised $15 million in funding led by Lerer Hippeau, the same venture firm that led Mirror’s $3 million seed round years earlier. That earlier bet paid off handsomely when Putnam sold Mirror to Lululemon in 2020.

Putnam sees Board as a natural evolution of what she learned building consumer hardware with Mirror. “Mirror was very much about me,” she told TechCrunch. “It was my reflection, my performance, it was about making your own self better. At that next phase, my life was really just much more about my family and my friends and my relationships.”

The result is a product built around a simple but increasingly popular idea: the best use of technology might be to get people to put their devices down and look each other in the face.

The raise comes at a time when consumer tech, long out of favor with investors, is showing signs of a comeback. Much of that momentum is driven by what AI is making newly possible.

“I’m more excited about consumer than I’ve been in a long time,” said Ben Lerer, managing partner of Lerer Hippeau, during a separate interview with TechCrunch late last year. “We’re seeing a very high-quality group of founders saying, ‘Now’s the time to get back in the pool.’ There are things that are possible today that weren’t possible six months ago or a year ago, and the slope is steep.”