Zelos operates a cross-game battle-pass system that issues daily challenges across supported titles and rewards players with a virtual currency called zips for completing them. Zips can be redeemed for digital goods and gift cards (examples in the article include $5 Steam cards, Apex Coins, and game download codes). Each challenge also grants EXP to level up a Zelos profile, unlocking additional zips, challenges, and avatar items. The product currently tracks stats and issues challenges across seven games (Fortnite, Apex, League of Legends, Teamfight Tactics, DOTA 2, Counter-Strike: GO and Clash Royale), though tracking fidelity varies by developer API access. Zelos is testing a subscription-based premium battle pass that would unlock more challenges, increase rewards, and accelerate point earnings as its monetization strategy. The team is LA-based, emerged from Y Combinator’s Winter 2020 batch, and is led by co-founders Jeffrey Tong and Derek Chiang; Tong previously built and sold OverStats and Chiang was a senior software engineer at Dfinity. The company says it raised $2.8 million in the days after YC demo day, has about 50,000 weekly active users (55% play two or more games on the platform), and currently has a three-person team planning to hire six to seven more.

Total raised

$3M

Funding rounds

1

Latest round

Equity

Latest activity

Apr 2020