Share Creators wants to solve asset management mess for game developers

techcrunch.com:

Finding a product-market fit isn’t always easy, but when you are the end-user experiencing a real pain point, the solution might be more obvious. That’s the case for newly funded Share Creators, a platform that helps game developers manage and store large media assets as remote work becomes increasingly common in the industry.

Based in the Bay Area, the startup recently closed a new round of funding, a $3 million tranche from China’s 5Y Capital and $2 million from PDF reader Foxit.

Before getting into art asset management, Ada Liu ran a game-design consulting firm that was raking in several million USD in revenue a year; that business is now running alongside her new venture.

“Dropbox started in 2007, the year when the first iPhone was launched, ushering in the transition from PC to mobile. A decade later, the fundamental way of data storage hasn’t really evolved,” says Liu when asked why she decided to launch another startup despite having handsome income from the consulting firm. “Asset management technology will have to advance.”

Having worked as a game artist for the San Francisco outpost of NetEase, China’s second-largest gaming firm, Liu is uniquely positioned to understand gaming businesses in China and the U.S.

Indeed, she spotted an opportunity as Chinatightened control over the domestic gaming sector, which drove Tencent, NetEase and rising developers like MiHoYoto seek more growth abroad. A number of them began outsourcing production to Liu’s firm, whether it’s designing in-game characters or making promotional material for overseas markets — any work that can’t be efficiently done in-house as video games become more sophisticated by the day.

As her design business took off, Liu detected another demand from her