Animoca Brands refutes claims of scaling back metaverse fund target and plummeting valuation

Animoca Brands, a venture capital firm and Web3 game developer, has refuted recent claims that it has scaled back its metaverse fund target by $200 million, or 20%, amid volatility in the crypto market and instability in the banking sector. The firm also downplayed suggestions that its valuation has plummeted from $6 billion as of July 2022 to roughly $2 billion in March 2023.

The claims were reported by Reuters on March 24, citing anonymous “people familiar with the matter,” who alleged that Animoca initially halved its $2 billion metaverse fund target in January and recently cut it another 20% to $800 million. The fund was announced in November 2022 to allocate capital to mid-to-late-stage startups with a metaverse focus, and Animoca co-founder and chairman Yat Siu outlined at the time that the fund target was between $1 billion and $2 billion, depending on how much capital was raised.

While Animoca acknowledged that the banking collapses in the United States have had an impact on available venture capital, the firm stressed that the final amount raised for the fund has yet to be determined. “When the raise is concluded, we will inform the market with the appropriate details, including the final size of this fund,” the firm stated.

Regarding the company’s valuation, Animoca asserted that the figures reported by Reuters and “two other” unnamed sources were inaccurate. The firm argues that its total market cap is not fully represented by the data from PrimaryMarkets, where its shares have traded since being delisted from the Australian Stock Exchange in March 2020.

Animoca terminated its arrangement with PrimaryMarkets in the second half of 2020, but the platform continued to trade its shares. The firm stated that “trading volume is far too low to provide the price accuracy you would find on an actual primary market.”

While the claims made in the Reuters report remain unverified, they highlight the impact of recent events on the crypto market and fundraising efforts. Animoca’s stance suggests that the firm is still confident in its ability to raise capital for its metaverse fund and that its valuation is higher than what has been reported. However, it remains to be seen how successful the fundraising efforts will be and whether Animoca will meet its original target for the fund.

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Animoca Brands Cuts Metaverse Fund Target to $800M

In recent news, Animoca Brands has reportedly reduced its target for its metaverse fund by a further 20% to $800 million, according to sources familiar with the matter. The company has scaled back on its billion-dollar goal due to the volatility in the crypto sector. Animoca Brands had previously announced in November 2022 that it was working on a new Animoca Capital fund with a target of $2 billion, but then halved that target to $1 billion in January 2023.

Two sources familiar with the matter disclosed that Animoca Brands’ market capitalization, which was previously valued at roughly $6 billion following a Temasek-led financing round in July 2022, has fallen to below $2 billion. The sources also shared that the company’s shares are trading at a considerably lower valuation in secondary markets. The decreased fundraising target and declining valuation signal a change in sentiment on the crypto industry, as excitement around such technologies has dwindled following scandals ranging from the collapse of FTX to the bankruptcy of several crypto lenders.

In 2022, Animoca Brands was named the most funded metaverse developer by Nasdaq, with Animoca having the most metaverse deals in 2022, closing 15 deals and receiving over $564 million in funding. As a prominent player in the metaverse industry, Animoca Brands holds a majority stake in The Sandbox, a leading metaverse platform. Apart from this investment, the company has actively participated in developing nonfungible tokens (NFTs) and GameFi.

Yat Siu, one of Animoca Brands’ co-founders, has stated that GameFi is expected to become one of the main gateways for the general public to access the metaverse. With the decreasing target for its metaverse fund and declining market capitalization, Animoca Brands’ focus may shift towards developing GameFi and other related projects.

It is worth noting that the metaverse has been a hot topic in the tech industry, with companies like Facebook and Roblox investing heavily in it. However, the hype around the metaverse has been tempered by concerns about its potential impact on privacy, security, and social inequality. As the metaverse industry evolves, it will be interesting to see how companies like Animoca Brands adapt and navigate the challenges and opportunities that lie ahead.

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Animoca Brands refutes claims of scaled back metaverse fund and plummeting valuation

Animoca Brands, a venture capital firm and web3 game developer, has denied recent reports that it has scaled back its metaverse fund target and experienced a significant drop in its valuation. The company refuted claims that it had reduced its metaverse fund target by $200 million, or 20%, to $800 million amid volatility in the crypto market and instability in the banking sector. The firm also downplayed suggestions that its valuation had plummeted from $6 billion as of July 2022 to roughly $2 billion in March 2023.

These claims were made in a March 24 Reuters report that cited anonymous “people familiar with the matter.” According to the report, Animoca initially halved its $2 billion metaverse fund target in January and recently cut it by another 20% to $800 million. However, Animoca co-founder and chairman Yat Siu had previously outlined that the fund target was between $1 billion and $2 billion, depending on how much capital was raised.

The metaverse fund, which was announced in November 2022, was designed to allocate capital to mid-to-late-stage startups with a metaverse focus. Animoca acknowledged that the banking collapses in the United States have had an impact on fundraising but stressed that the final amount raised for the fund has yet to be determined.

“While there’s no doubt that the FTX and banking crises have had a serious impact on available venture capital, fundraising for the Animoca Capital fund is in progress,” the firm stated. “When the raise is concluded, we will inform the market with the appropriate details, including the final size of this fund.”

In terms of its valuation, Animoca asserted that the figures reported by Reuters and other unnamed sources were inaccurate. The company, which trades as AB1, was initially listed on the Australian Stock Exchange (ASX) in its early days. However, AB1 was delisted back in March 2020 due to the ASX’s assertions that Animoca had breached its listing rules by being involved in crypto-related activities, among other things.

Since then, its shares have traded on unlisted stock-focused exchanges such as the Sydney-based PrimaryMarkets. The data from this platform was used to calculate a total market cap of AB1 at around roughly $2 billion. However, Animoca argues that these figures don’t fully represent the company’s total valuation.

“The claim […] that Animoca Brands ‘now trades its shares on PrimaryMarkets’ is not technically correct. We terminated our arrangement with PrimaryMarkets in the second half of 2020, but PrimaryMarkets chose to continue to trade Animoca Brands shares on its platform,” the firm stated. “We do not consider the thin trading activity on PrimaryMarkets to accurately reflect the company’s value. Trading volume is far too low to provide the price accuracy you would find on an actual primary market.”

Despite the challenges faced by the company, Animoca remains committed to its mission of developing web3 games and supporting startups focused on the metaverse. The firm has been at the forefront of the booming metaverse industry and is well-positioned to capitalize on its growth. As the industry continues to evolve and mature, it will be interesting to see how Animoca Brands navigates the challenges and opportunities that lie ahead.

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Metaverse Will Bring About the “Construction of New Economies” – Animoca CEO

Yat Siu, the Co-Founder and Chief Executive Officer of Animoca Brands has shared his thoughts on what he believes the metaverse is metamorphosing into in the near future. 

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Speaking at the Future Blockchain Summit, the veteran industry leader noted that the metaverse is not a central entity and is bound to stir the advent of new economies that will benefit its adopters.

In the explanation for his position about the highly talked-about marketplace, Siu said industries cannot be quantities based on a single metric, and that the collective performance of key offshoots of the ecosystem often comes together to make a whole.

“Metaverse to us is a whole economy. We don’t want to measure the future of these companies using PNL, we want to measure it in terms of GDP. Just like we can’t define Ethereum’s value by how much gas it generates but rather its utility as a whole, in the same way, the metaverse is an all-accomplishing picture. So, thematically, it’s a metaverse; but practically, itu2019s digital ownership.”

Siu faults the usurping role big tech companies like Google and Facebook have played in the evolution of the gaming industry thus far. According to him, the bigger portion of the more than $200 billion industry is controlled by big tech with little going to the game developers and almost nothing to players.

Per the model of Web3.0, Siu believes this anomaly will be corrected, creating an economy whereby everyone will be fairly compensated for their participation in the ecosystem.

“More than half of the value that is generated in the gaming industry goes to Apple, Facebook and Google. How much of that goes back to the gaming industry? Zero. This is the issue today, and it makes the ecosystem unhealthy.”

Yat Siu, whose company owns The Sandbox metaverse and has invested in hundreds of gaming protocols believes GameFi is one of the contending avenues by which users will be onboarded into the Web3.0 industry.

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dYdX Taps ConsenSys’ Charles d’Haussy as CEO of its Foundation

dydx, one of the most prominent and powerful Decentralized Exchanges (DEX) in the crypto ecosystem, has announced the appointment of Charles d’Haussy, a crypto leader from ConsenSys, to serve as the Chief Executive of its Foundation.

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As the new boss of its not-for-profit foundation, Charles will bring his wealth of experience to help dydx chart an ambitious path forward. With the dydx Foundation tasked with supporting the dYdX protocol, Charles’s track records with ConsenSys and as a FinTech head with the Hong Kong government will help him in delivering just the right growth strides for the protocol.

Since its inception in 2017, dYdX now ranks as the biggest DEX in today’s DeFi world. At the time of writing, the protocol has over $342 million in daily trading volume and ranks well above Kine Protocol and Uniswap V3, according to data from CoinMarketCap

As part of its growth push, dYdX has unveiled plans to launch its V4 engine, which is slated for the second quarter of 2023. With Charles now at the helm of affairs, the perfect delivery of its new trading engine will be amongst the top things on his agenda as he assumes office.

“I am very excited to welcome Charles into his role as CEO of dYdX Foundation. His wealth of cross-industry experiences engaging with different stakeholders will be an extremely valuable addition to the Foundation and lead us to the next stage of growth, “Arthur Cheong, President of dYdX Foundation Council.

Amongst his core roles will be pushing for new partnerships for the protocol, drawing on his experiences in international business relations. 

The mega shift in leadership for the decentralized exchange protocol mimics related moves from top platforms and startups in the Web3.0 ecosystem. One of the outfits most aggressive with its hiring spree is Animoca Brands, whose recent appointments featured Jared Shaw as its Chief Financial Officer back in September.

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Animoca Brands Hires Jared Shaw as New CFO

Blockchain venture capital and gaming startup Animoca Brands have added new experts to its executive train, highlighting yet again its readiness to take a frontline leadership role in the industry. 

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In the latest update, Animoca Brands said it has hired Jared Shaw as its new Chief Financial Officer (CFO). Shaw’s experiences also feature the Gemini exchange, where he held a similar role and was instrumental in helping the crypto exchange chart an ambitious growth.

As the new CFO at Animoca Brands, the company said Shaw will oversee and support the strategic financial direction of Animoca Brands and its more than 380 portfolio companies.

“Jared has a wealth of experience spanning audit, asset management, crypto, and more. He joins us at a time when the finance team is growing rapidly and building strong capabilities,” Evan Auyang, president of Animoca Brands, “Jared brings to us not only relevant experience from leading Gemini’s finance operations, but also extensive business, audit, and asset management experience at Goldman Sachs, Ernst & Young, and Prudential. We believe that Jared’s strong leadership background will help to take Animoca Brands to the next level.”

Animoca Brands is one of the most capitalized companies in the digital currency ecosystem, having topped its liquidity pool with a new $110 million funding received earlier this month, as reported by Blockchain.News. 

To properly position its business, Animoca Brands has also hired May Szeto as the Group’s HR Director, Jamii Quoc as the Head of Legal – Commercial and M&A, Samuel Tse as the M&A Director, and Josh Du who will be the new Head of Digital Assets Portfolio.

Buffing up its management team is not a new move for Animoca Brands, as the company made a related pushback in July. At the time, it added Alan Lau as the Chief Business Officer, as well as a host of other industry veterans. 

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Animoca Brands Reached Agreement to Acquire Game Developer WePlay Media

On September 16, according to the official announcement, Blockchain gaming, and investment company, Animoca Brands announced that it has acquired WePlay Media, the developer of MotoGP Championship Quest, and reached a membership rights purchase agreement.

WePlay Media is the sole shareholder of the Official License of MotoGP™. MotoGP Championship Quest, the main mobile game under the MotoGP brand, was launched in 2017 and is the first official mobile game jointly developed by Brembo and American game manufacturer WePlay Media.

In this game, fans can choose their favorite MotoGP drivers to experience braking fun.

The game has been downloaded more than 50 million times on mobile platforms and has approximately 1.2 million monthly active users worldwide.

The agreement states that Graeme Warring, COO of WePlay Media, will continue to lead the MotoGP™ project, working with Animoca Brands’ REVV Motorsport team, which operates the blockchain game MotoGP™ Ignition.

The acquisition is designed to enhance Animoca Brands and WePlay Media’s product integration with the REVV ecosystem and with WePlay Media, providing users with opportunities to play and monetize motorsports-focused mobile games, build existing partnerships and expand fan engagement.

Yat Siu, co-founder of Animoca Brands commented

“The acquisition of WePlay Media will boost our engagement with fans of the amazing sport of MotoGP, unlocking powerful exposure in both the metaverse and traditional gaming. We are gaining a unique platform to implement our Web3 strategy as we incorporate our motorsport-based REVV Token and NFT programs with the official MotoGP mobile game and deepen our strategic relationship with MotoGP.”

Just recently, Animoca Brands raised new capital worth $110 million from the issuance of convertible notes.

The leading gaming platform remains committed to expanding its footprint in the digital currency ecosystem as it is searching for the next mega unicorn like The Sandbox.

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Singapore’s DBS Acquires Land in The Sandbox Metaverse

The Development Bank of Singapore (DBS), a multinational financial institution based in Marina Bay Singapore has proposed to secure land in The Sandbox metaverse which is an arm of Animoca Brands, a blockchain virtual, and investment firm.

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DBS is set to acquire a 3×3 LAND piece in The Sandbox metaverse, a type of virtual property to experience a better and more sustainable world according to a report.

DBS asserts that it is both the first Singaporean business to collaborate with The Sandbox and the first regional bank to engage with the metaverse. The bank declared that it will also purchase carbon offsets to make its metaverse carbon neutral.

“As we stretch the limits of what the metaverse can do, our cooperation with The Sandbox and Animoca Brands represents the beginning of a thrilling collaboration,” said Piyush Gupta, CEO of DBS, “We also look forward to using it as an extra cutting-edge platform to raise awareness of crucial ESG (environmental, social, and governance) concerns and to highlight partners and communities doing admirable work to solve them’’.

DBS Emerging as a Frontier in the Digital Space

DBS’s acquisition of The Sandbox’s property comes after the launch of its crypto exchange for Bitcoin (BTC), Ripple (XRP), Ethereum (ETH), and other altcoins in 2020. According to Gupta, the DBS exchange appears to be the first cryptocurrency exchange that would be backed by a traditional bank.

The multinational bank claimed that despite a significant global decline in the value of digital assets, its purchases of Bitcoin accounted for 90% of all crypto trading activities. The bank has witnessed a high amount of digital exchange which caters to family exchange and institutional investors.

Animoca Brands earlier received new money worth $110 million through the sale of convertible notes according. The Convertible Notes, which were issued at a price of AU$4.5 ($3) and have a three-year expiration date, do not alter the company’s valuation from its previous investment round as stated by the firm.

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Animoca Brands Confirms New $110m Funding Round

Blockchain gaming and investment company Animoca Brands has raised new capital worth $110 million from the issuance of convertible notes. 

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According to the company’s announcement, the funding round was opened to a limited number of investors, which includes Temasek, Boyu Capital, and GGV Capital, as well as existing investors Mirae Asset Management and True Global Ventures (TGV). 

As detailed by the firm, the Convertible Notes, which will expire in three years, were issued at a price of AU$4.5 ($3), and it does not change the company’s valuation from its last funding round. 

“We are incredibly pleased to complete a special strategic round of fundraising comprising several of the most respected institutional investors in the world, and we are honoured by the continued support from existing investors,” Yat Siu, co-founder and executive chairman of Animoca Brands, “said Animoca Brands has grown significantly as a company in the last year, and our new investors will contribute strategic advice and perspective as we build the world’s leading company furthering digital property rights in the Web3 industry.” 

According to Animoca Brands, the newly onboarded group of investors will also play a crucial in advising the firm on its planned business strategies. The newly received funding will also be deployed to “strategic fund acquisitions, investments, and product development, secure licenses for popular intellectual properties, and advance the open metaverse, including through its efforts to promote digital property rights for online users.”

Animoca Brands has strategically positioned itself this year as the delight of investors. The sale of these Convertible Notes is the third time since the parent company to be raised capital this year. While this funding round was hinted at earlier, Animoca Japan secured $45 million in funding, further expanding its ecosystem.

The leading gaming platform remains committed to expanding its footprint in the digital currency ecosystem as it is searching for the next mega unicorn like The Sandbox.

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Metaverse Giants Collaborate to Form DAO Metaverse Alliance

The blockchain metaverse giants have collaborated to form the DAO Metaverse called “Open Metaverse Alliance for Web3” (OMA3), which aims to bring together multiple virtual worlds to solve the key challenges of the metaverse and maintain users’ freedom of information.

Game developers joining the consortium of the Open Metaverse Alliance for Web3 include Animoca Brands, a developer of games and other applications for smartphones; blockchain-based game Alien Worlds; a consumer-focused flow blockchain product made for fun and games Dapper Labs; Decentraland; Star Atlas, and The Sandbox, etc.

OMA3 is established on a competitive Decentralized Autonomous Organization (DAO) structure, incentivizing the entire industry to share data ownership and attract user interaction from a more transparent and objective perspective.

The DAO, a form of investor-oriented venture capital fund, aims to provide enterprises with new decentralized business models. Community members come together and have the power to vote on governance decisions, create flexible workflows and allocate resources, enabling new decentralized business models for the entire team.

The official statement states: “We believe in a metaverse without restraining walls, where individual platforms are interconnected and fully interoperable. To realize this goal of an open metaverse, we are announcing the creation of OMA3 and inviting all blockchain-based metaverse companies to join.”

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