OdysseyML has announced the successful completion of an $18 million Series A funding round led by EQT Ventures. The funding will be used to develop generative world-building models that are trained on real-world data, enabling applications in film and gaming. The company is creating a comprehensive dataset of real-world locations captured in high-fidelity 3D using a custom hardware device. This initiative aims to provide a new source of training data, akin to Google Street View, but for areas inaccessible to vehicles. Meanwhile, Niantic is also advancing in this space with its Large Geospatial Model, which seeks to enhance spatial intelligence for augmented reality applications. Niantic's Visual Positioning System (VPS) is designed to enable machines to perceive the real world similarly to humans, facilitating the integration of digital content into physical spaces.