Arc Maker The Browser Company Raises Another $50 Million

The Browser Company, makers of the innovative Arc web browser, has raised another $50 million in a recent investment round, bringing the total investment in the company to $128 million and valuing it at $550 million.

“Now, more than ever, we continue to believe that the successor to the Personal
Computer (PC) is imminent,” The Browser Company’s Nashilu Mouen said in response to questions about this fundraising. “And that it starts in the browser. We’ll see you there.”

News of the new investment round was first reported by Techcrunch, which went on to recap the small company’s short history—it was founded in 2019, has released a Mac version of its web browser, a less full-featured Windows version in closed beta, and a controversial mobile app that speaks to its AI aims—before discussing why investors are so excited about this company.

“When a technological seam opens up, you get an expanding frontier,” lead investor Chris Paik told the publication. “When the area to innovate is increasing, the only thing that matters is your rate of innovation. Any fixed amount of innovation will quickly be commoditized. This is ingrained in the DNA of The Browser Company. They ship every week, constantly pushing the boundaries of product innovation.”

The Browser Company’s goals are both lofty and innovative, and as I noted in Web Browsers, Innovation, and the Future (Premium), this is the only truly unique product in this market, which is striking considering how important web browsers, web apps, and websites are to all users. I’ve been working on an article about the Arc browser experience on Mac and hope to post that soon, given how much more impressive it is on that platform than on the PC. But for now, I’ll just leave this with a bit that won’t be included in that write-up, a curious bit of strategy explanation that appears in the footnotes to the statement noted above:

“Eighteen months ago, we published our first-ever video piece, entitled The Internet Computer. Since then, our belief that it’s time to re-imagine the personal computer has only grown stronger. We would, of course, be remiss not to mention the seismic shift that the November 30, 2022 introduction of ChatGPT catalyzed across our industry—and the large, unanswered question of the interface for this next era of computing. The place where we’ve spent four years laying the groundwork for what comes next. From connecting bespoke, fluid interfaces to browser engines, to bringing Swift to non-Apple platforms, and now developing in-house the infrastructure needed to build personalized agent experiences across web apps and pages. There will be fellow Davids, there will be Goliaths. Thank you for being on this journey with us—the race is on.”