Esports revenues are expected to exceed a billion dollars per year for the first time and expected to increase rapidly as the industry continues to attract players, teams, and fans at an explosive pace. Competitive video gaming is a serious business with lucrative rewards for those that are the most skilled. Seeking a way to finetune their gaming skills, Amine Issa and his cofounders founded Mobalytics, the gaming analytics platform for competitive gamers to master their trade through player development, strategy, and tracking. Issa shares some insight on the state of the esports industry, the company’s future plans, and recent round of funding from investors that include HP Tech Ventures, General Catalyst, GGV Capital, RRE Ventures, Axiomatic, and T1 Esports.
Gaming
What Brands Need to Know About Esports
As we navigate this new landscape of work and business post-corona, esports is one of the many industries that’s being heavily impacted. In my opinion, this is going to be a watershed moment for esports.
Carbonated Games Raises $8.5M To Bring Hardcore Competitive Gaming to Mobile Devices
Once a gamer, always a gamer – at least that’s what we gathered from our interview with industry veteran and cofounder, Travis Boatman, of Carbonated Games, the new game studio that designs intense, competitive games for mobile devices. Carbonated Games creates experiences for gamers that have a busy life but still miss the hardcore, competitive games they used to play on console and PC, taking a modern approach to these games by designing ultra-competitive, player vs. player (PVP) games that are meant to be played on mobile devices, abandoning the need for additional hardware. Boatman shares more about the team behind the studio, the company’s first title, MadWorld, and the company’s recent funding round led by by Andreessen Horowitz, Golden Ventures, and BITKFAFT Ventures.
DMarket Raises $6.6M to Power the Virtual Economy in Gaming
DMarket is an in-game item trading platform and a monetization technology for game developers, content creators, brands, and players. DMarket technology is an engine to power platforms and digital worlds, creating a virtual economy. CEO and Founder Vlad Panchenko shares more on how the company is using blockchain to make gaming profitable for brands, creators, players, and developers.
Treehouse Games $2.6M for its Gaming Studio Focused on Collective Experiences
With video games immersive and interactive experiences captivating audiences like never, Treehouse Games announced the launch of its gaming studio that designs interactive, cooperative games instead of narrative-based single-player games. Treehouse Games is currently building its first game and the team is hard at work to translate the feeling of doing something with/for others into the gameplay. At a time where society is longing for social connections, even if virtual, and with American video game usage increased by 75 percent during the quarantine, Treehouse Games is poised to make an impact.
CEO Michael Chu tells us more about building games that focus on cooperation rather than competition, the challenge of fundraising during COVID-19, and the company’s upcoming plans.
Kippo Raises $2M for its Dating App for Gamers
Cofounded by one of the early team members at Raya (the highly-exclusive dating app), Kippo is a dating app designed specifically for gamers. Kippo CEO and Cofounder David Park walks us through why there is a need for a dating app for gamers, the company’s future plans, and recent funding round.
Rogue Games, Inc. Raises Another $2M to Help Indie Game Developers Bring Games to Market
Gaming is a popular entertainment outlet, especially during the pandemic. In fact, DeLaet states, “Games are also actively supporting the WHO and CDC by encouraging players to stay home and support social distancing recommendations to help flatten the curve”. LA TechWatch sat down with Rogue Games, Inc. CEO Mike DeLaet to learn about how Rogue helps independent game developers push their titles to market.
Robin Games Raises $7M to Fuse Lifestyle Content with Gaming
“I’ve been circling around this idea for quite some time because I’ve wanted to play the games we’ll be making but couldn’t find them in the current market. I’ve always designed products for myself first and foremost, which allows me to deeply connect with what the end-user really wants, since the end-user is me!”
Where We Are Investing Now: Esports/Gaming SaaS
Venture capitalist Mike Edelhart lays out what he sees as a single seam in Esports and gaming content that has true venture scale – Esports SaaS. Esports SaaS companies have these characteristics.
Croquet Raises $2.7M to Help Game Developers Build Interactive Multiplayer Experiences
People are excited about the world of gaming, especially people in Los Angeles. It was only a few weeks ago that the esports infrastructure company, Nerd Street Gamers, announced that it’s building the largest, public esports arena – right in Hawthorne. Now that LA is leading the world in gaming, physical infrastructure, it also needs […]
ProGuides Raises $5M to be the One-Stop Training Curriculum for Esports Gamers
The hype around esports is real. The highest-earning competitive gamer Johan Sundstein, better known as N0tail, raked in a total of around $6.9M for Dota 2, so it’s no surprise that more people are looking to become competitive gamers. ProGuides is the structured, curriculum-based learning tool helping beginners become competitive and expert gamers to practice […]