Rapport Acquires Aquifer Motion, Becoming the First Company to Offer Real-Time, AI-Powered Avatars with Full-Body Animation

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SAN FRANCISCO & AUSTIN, Texas & EDINBURGH, Scotland--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Oct 7, 2025--

Rapport, the industry leader in real-time facial and full-body animation AI-powered avatars and a division of Speech Graphics, today announced its acquisition of Aquifer Motion, the AI-powered animation platform used by the world’s top entertainment brands. Until now, most AI avatars have been limited to facial expressions and basic lip sync. Rapport’s acquisition of Aquifer Motion marks a major leap forward in digital human and avatar technology, as it positions Rapport as the first AI avatar company to combine industry-leading facial animation with full-body movement and cinematic-quality camera movement and scene direction—all in real time.

“The acquisition of Aquifer Motion takes Rapport from being a leader in AI-powered avatars to redefining the entire category and setting the standard with both facial and full body animation,” said Gregor Hofer, CEO and co-founder of Rapport. “By combining Aquifer Motion’s technology and team with Rapport, we’re giving enterprises the power to deliver real-time AI-driven character experiences with cinematic quality and unmatched scalability, something the industry has been waiting for and competitors simply can’t match.”

The integration of Aquifer Motion’s animation and scene direction tools enables Rapport to deliver emotionally engaging, lifelike avatars capable of full-body performance. Learning and development teams, enterprises focused on sales enablement, marketing, and creative agencies can now generate real-time avatar conversational experiences in a matter of minutes without requiring Hollywood-level budgets, long development timelines or technical complexity.

“Joining Rapport marks an exciting new chapter for Aquifer Motion. We’re giving teams across industries the ability to tell stories and build connections in ways that simply weren’t possible before, while making character animation faster and more scalable,” said Chen Zhang, CEO and co-founder of Aquifer Motion. “From learning and development, and marketing to customer support, this is about creating experiences that are not just seen or heard—but felt.”

Under the terms of the acquisition agreement, Zhang joins Rapport as Chief Growth Officer, reporting directly to Rapport CEO Hofer. The Aquifer Motion team also joins Rapport and will remain based in Austin, TX.

Rapport’s B2B platform enables non-technical users to create digital characters, opening up new ways for audiences to engage with their teams through real-time, AI-driven avatar experiences in various industries, including learning and development, sales and marketing. Rapport’s technology seamlessly integrates with all major providers of AI services (ChatGPT, Gemini, GROK), as well as with Speech-To-Text (AWS, Microsoft Azure, Speechmatics) and Text-To-Speech (AWS Polly, Google Cloud, ElevenLabs) capabilities.

Rapport offers flexible pricing options, including a free 'Explorer' tier and a 'Creator' tier priced at just $0.21 per minute of interaction. Custom pricing is also available for high-volume users.

Rapport is a division of Speech Graphics, the industry leader in real-time voice-driven facial animation, and the standard solution to animate character faces in video games such as Call of Duty, The Last of Us 2, and Hogwarts Legacy.

See the Rapport Self-Service platform in action here or learn more at https://www.rapport.cloud.

About Aquifer Motion

Aquifer Motion is an AI-powered animation platform built for speed, quality, and ease of use. Trusted by the world’s top entertainment brands such as Paw Patrol, NBC Universal, and El Reino Infantil, Aquifer enables non-animator creators to produce high-fidelity animated character content for marketing, entertainment, and enterprise applications.

About Rapport

Rapport is an AI-powered platform that brings human-like digital avatars to life with real-time facial and full-body animation powered by cutting-edge video game Speech Graphics technology. Designed for learning and development teams, sales leaders, marketers and innovators across industries like healthcare, hospitality, and retail, Rapport makes it easy to create interactive, conversational simulations at scale, with no code, no video editing and no scheduling headaches. Scalable, customizable and fun, Rapport helps people learn by doing, while developers and agencies can build solutions for clients.

A division of Speech Graphics, Rapport is a privately held company with offices in San Francisco, Austin, Edinburgh, Budapest and Singapore. Follow Rapport on LinkedIn or learn more at rapport.cloud.

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CONTACT: Media Contacts:

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Mercury Global Partners for Rapport

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[email protected] Held-Hernandez

Mercury Global Partners for Rapport

+1 480 306 1154 (Washington D.C.)

[email protected]

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SOURCE: Rapport

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PUB: 10/07/2025 09:03 AM/DISC: 10/07/2025 09:04 AM

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