To Spark Children’s Imaginations, Hullabalu Raises $1.8 Million From SV Angel, Great Oaks & Others For iPad Storytelling App

New York-based Hullabalu is launching today with a new take on children’s storytelling. Instead of digital books containing interactive bits, as is now common on iPad, this new tablet app itself is the story where the action progresses as children engage with the magical world Hullabalu introduces.The startup was founded mid-2012 by Suzanne Xie, whose first company, Weardrobe, wasacquired by iLike.com in 2009, then later sold to Google with iLike where it became Google Boutiques. She more recently launched subscription-based snacks via Lollihop, which closed in early 2012.With Hullabalu, Xie has leveraged her industry experience and connections to fund her new creation, raising $1.8 million from investors including SV Angel, Great Oaks Venture Capital, Rothenberg Ventures, Liberty City Ventures, as well as angels like Gokul Rajaram (head of ads at Facebook),Garry Tan (YC partner, Posterous co-founder), Chris McCann (President of 1-800 Flowers), Alexis Ohanian (Reddit co-founder), Brian Sugar (founder of Popsugar), Mike Greenfield (Circle of Moms founder); Fran Hauser (President of Time, Inc. Digital); Andy McLouglin (Huddle founder);Michael Levit (partner at Founders Den); Scott Tannen, Josh Spear, Soraya Darabi(Foodspotting co-founder), and others.

Xie says she was inspired to enter the world of children’s entertainment because of her own fond memories of reading sci-fi and fantasy when she was a kid — and her team feels the same way.

“But there’s not much of that that’s being told to younger kids,” she explains. “There’s obviously many reasons behind it, but obviously one of the biggest is that, traditionally, stories have always been told through text and with worlds that are rich. It’s often very hard to get that across to a young child. There’s too much text and vocabulary for them to understand,” Xie says.

“With how kids are picking up the iPad and learning how to interact with apps, we thought this was the perfect time for us to create a fantastical story,” she adds.

Hullabalu is launching as a paid iPad application ($3.99), introducing the child to an adorably crafted purple panda bear called Pan, who has adventures alongside a cast of characters in the magical world of Hullabalu.

One of the most noticeable things about the application is that it offers high-quality design and animation, the likes of which aren’t often seen in early-stage startups unless they’ve licensed content from bigger companies. There are a few exceptions, of course: Leo’s Pad from Kidaptive comes to mind, but that one has the benefit of having the president of a 3D animation studio as its CEO.

Hullabalu, meanwhile, has only a team of six, many of them young and relatively new to the industry. Xie is the sole founder, and serves as the lead writer and editor of these Hullabalu “stories.”

It should also be noted that Hullabalu isn’t purely educational in nature the way many of today’s children’s apps are — that is, it’s not core curriculum-based, though it does teach logical thinking in the sense that actions have consequences. While there is some text that appears at the bottom of the screens, it’s narrated and can be hidden from view. Simply put, the app is less about learning to read, and more about sparking children’s creativity and imagination, Xie says.

In addition to the story itself, kids can also launch a photo booth app from the homescreen for a little bit of extra fun. Going forward, Hullabalu plans to expand its lineup to include additional applications that continue the story, the first of which is due out this summer, and the next arriving later this year.

Initially, the plan is to generate revenue by charging for the app, but the eventual goal is to introduce merchandise like stuffed animals (some of which already decorate the startup’s offices), stickers, stationery, and more.

Me Books Brings Children’s Favorite Books To iPad, Lets You Be The Narrator

Many of the children’s e-book applications for iPad today use a combination of animations, video or even games to make books more “interactive” for their young readers. Me Books, a London-based digital e-book app and retailer launching today in the U.S., has a slightly different take. Instead of animation, the app uses audio to add an additional element to stories. The e-books are narrated, and include artwork that kids can tap to hear characters speak, too. In addition, readers (or their parents) can also record their own voices over the default narration to customize the experience even further.

Me Books is the latest creation to ship from the team at Made in Me, a studio originally founded back in 2009 by former visual effects artists James Huggins and his brother-in-law Mike Outlaw. In the pre-tablet era, the company had produced a series of desktop applications under the “Land of Me” brand, which allowed children to swap out the words in the story to change what happens within the interactive world of “Land of Me.”

That experience was later ported over to iOS, but co-founder Huggins admits that it never really took off. The app reached around 75,000 downloads versus the desktop version’s approximately quarter of a million.

So the company turned its focus in a new direction, and began to work on Me Books. But instead of thinking up new ways to change the content within the e-books themselves, Huggins and team focused on changing the overall experience, especially the audio, which he says is an under-utilized area.

“It’s a very deliberate stance against taking – not new forms of storytelling, but taking physical books that we know – to the digital space in a way that respects the experience of reading a book,” Huggins explains.

The free app has been available in the U.K. since October where it’s been averaging 1,000 downloads per day and has now reached over 110,000 as of April. Today, it’s available worldwide, including here in the U.S.

Me Books ships with one title for free, then other books can be purchased for $2.99 (USD) within the app. Unlike some book apps where a large number of titles come from the public domain, Me Books’ titles come from publishers like Penguin, Harper Collins, Scholastic, Macmillan, Hachette, Puffin, Bloomsbury, and others.

“[The selection] is heavily curated, really diverse, but it’s never going to be exhaustive or comprehensive. It’s going to be numbering in the hundreds of books, rather than the thousands, but it will be a really good cross-section of books for children,” Huggins says. The app will include both classics and modern titles, as well as TV tie-ins.

Today, U.K. users have around 130 titles to choose from, while U.S. readers have 80 to 90 at launch.

However, the title selection and narration is still “very British” right now, says Huggins. And while that might work for something like “Peter Rabbit,” U.S. users who prefer a more American feel may want to wait for the forthcoming U.S.-based publishers and brands which will arrive in the app over the next couple of months, he suggests. (Or they can swap out the default narration for their own).

The company splits the revenue it earns with publishers 50/50 (after Apple’s take), and the app itself is free.

Based in London, the ten-person team had raised angel funding for “Land of Me” years ago, and raised from the same angels another small amount to get “Me Books” off the ground, but is preparing to raise a larger round in the near future.

U.S. users can now download the new app from here.