Participated · Series B · May 2019

Immortals Gaming Club is an esports operator that owns team brands (Immortals, MIBR) and the Gamers Club matchmaking platform. The company acquired Gamers Club in May 2019 and has expanded that business to six countries, with core subscriber growth of 400% and monthly active users up 900%. Gamers Club supplies analytics that inform product and growth decisions, and Immortals plans to lean on that data as a strategic asset. IGC is selling its Call of Duty League franchise (OpTic Gaming Los Angeles) to 100 Thieves to focus on stronger brands. The company says it has a strong balance sheet and raised $26 million to expand Gamers Club and its esports brands. Planned uses of the funding include geographic growth, title expansion, diversification of products and services, and growing MIBR beyond Latin America and outside CS:GO and Rainbow Six Siege. Immortals Gaming Club (IGC) combines competitive team operations and a direct-to-consumer matchmaking platform after rebranding from Immortals LLC. IGC operates esports rosters under the Immortals, Los Angeles Valiant and MIBR brands through IGC Esports, and owns Gamers Club, a Brazilian matchmaking and community hub. Gamers Club, based in Sorocaba, São Paulo, connects over 1 million registered gamers across Brazil, primarily serving CS:GO players with tournaments, coaching, premium content and social features. Company leadership includes CEO Ari Segal; Gamers Club co‑founders Yuri "Fly" Uchiyama and Juliano “Memelo” Mirandolli will continue to operate the platform and joined IGC’s senior management, and player Gabriel “FalleN” Toledo remains involved. IGC plans to expand Gamers Club into additional games and geographies, add future esports and gaming-related investments and operations, and create additional operating companies later in the year. The organization positions itself as the first-ever vertically integrated esports franchise operator and gaming platform, aiming for deeper integration of gaming communities. Immortals is a Los Angeles–based global esports organization founded in 2015 that fields teams across multiple competitive titles and brands. The organization competes in DOTA2 and Super Smash Brothers under the Immortals brand and runs a mobile division for Clash Royale and Arena of Valor. Immortals controls one of two Los Angeles slots in Activision Blizzard’s Overwatch League and owns the Los Angeles Valiant franchise. In June 2018 Immortals re-launched the Brazilian heritage brand MIBR for its CS:GO roster. The company has secured sponsorships with global brands including Betway, GameStop, K-Swiss, LF Gaming, Microsoft, Mountain Dew, Otter Pops, Razer, and Tinder, and has content partnerships with Lionsgate and STARZ. Immortals states a mission of building a long-lasting, inclusive community of professional gamers, aspiring players, and fans. Immortals, founded in 2015, is a North American esports organization that fields professional teams in League of Legends, CS:GO, Overwatch, Super Smash Bros., and Vainglory. The franchise competes worldwide and, per the article, engages more than 200 million fans through global tournaments. Immortals emphasizes fan support and player well-being and positions itself around community building and competitive excellence. As part of its growth, Immortals will host Los Angeles–based tournaments and events at AEG’s L.A. LIVE campus. The partnership with AEG is intended to leverage AEG’s venues, production facilities, and talent to broaden Immortals’ global appeal and fan experience. The article does not disclose Immortals’ revenues or other specific financial metrics. The Immortals is an e-sports team/franchise that has attracted investment from a range of high-profile backers. The article describes a strategic investment by movie studio Lionsgate, though the size of that investment was not announced. Immortals' existing investor base named in the article includes Michael Milken, Steve Kaplan, OakTree Capital, the Memphis Grizzlies, Greg Milken, Allen DeBevoise, CrossCut Ventures, and Clinton Foy, among many others. Lionsgate said the deal will help develop new content and leverage its distribution platforms to reach a coveted consumer demographic. The piece frames the Immortals investment as part of broader e-sports interest from media and entertainment companies. No operating metrics or financial totals were disclosed in the article.

Participated · Series C · Mar 2018

Atom Tickets offers an app that surfaces movie information (reviews, trailers), lets users share listings, poll friends, buy advance tickets with group seating and separate payments, and order concessions to skip lines. The product integrates social features with ticketing to enable group planning and to capture behavioral data for studios about what users look up, share and ultimately buy. After rolling out across the United States in 2016, the company says it tripled its users and ticket sales in one year, and it partners with chains including AMC, Regal, Southern Theatres, Showcase and B&B. Atom positions itself as a marketing and distribution channel for studios, helping target advertising and ticket-sales efforts amid pressure from streaming services and soft box office admissions. Management says the new funding will be used to innovate the product experience and create marketing campaigns to engage movie fans. Atom Tickets is a Santa Monica-based mobile app that lets users find and buy movie tickets for groups. The company offers iOS and Android apps that allow friends to coordinate ticket purchases, automatically share theater plans with friends, and pay for their tickets separately. Atom Tickets raised $50M in a funding round disclosed in early February 2016. The round was led by Lionsgate and included The Walt Disney Company and Fox as investors. The company was founded by Ameesh Paleja, Matthew Bakal, and Geoff Schaevitz. Paleja was the first employee and head of Amazon.com's digital R&D facility in Southern California, where he oversaw more than 550 employees.

Participated · Equity · Jan 2016

Next Games is a Helsinki-based mobile games developer that creates both internally developed IP and titles based on third-party properties. The studio, led by CEO Teemu Huuhtanen and about 70 employees, is behind Compass Point: West and The Walking Dead: No Man’s Land. The Walking Dead: No Man’s Land has had nearly 10 million downloads on the App Store and Google Play and will receive a content update as Season 6 of the TV show returns this February. Compass Point: West, a Wild West adventure-strategy game, saw strong metrics throughout 2015 and is slated to launch on Android devices in March 2016. Next Games raised an additional $10m in venture capital, bringing total funding to $18m, and plans to use the proceeds to grow existing mobile titles and launch an unannounced third project currently in development. Investors in the round include existing backers IDG Ventures and Jari Ovaskainen, plus AMC Networks, Lionsgate, Lowercase and IDG Capital. Next Games is a Helsinki-based game studio founded by veterans from Rovio, Supercell and Disney and led by CEO Teemu Huuhtanen. The company is developing a mobile version of AMC’s The Walking Dead and a second, unannounced mobile game. The Walking Dead title is in production and is planned for a worldwide debut on Android and iOS, with possible releases on other platforms. Next Games says it aims to build games that are popular on a global basis. The studio raised $6 million to fund its plans. The new capital will be used to pay for user acquisition and to finance game development.

Participated · Series B · Nov 2015

Tubi operates a free, ad-supported VOD service with a library of more than 12,000 movies and television series (about 40,000 hours of content) across devices including Roku, Amazon Fire TV, Samsung TVs, iOS, Android and Comcast X1. In 2018 the service saw viewership grow over 4.3x year-over-year, revenue grow over 180%, and it was profitable in Q4 2018. Tubi said it will reinvest profits into content acquisitions and plans to invest over nine figures to rapidly expand its catalog. The company closed a $25 million growth capital facility with Silicon Valley Bank to fund content acquisition and marketing. Tubi has formed distribution and ad-sales partnerships including Horizon Media (strategic partnership) and Rogers Media (exclusive Canadian ad sales representation). The service is currently available in the US and Canada and announced plans to launch in additional international territories in 2019. Tubi TV operates a free, ad-supported streaming service that aggregates a rotating catalog of over 50,000 titles from roughly 200 content partners, including Lionsgate, MGM, Paramount Pictures and Starz. The service targets millennial viewers and spans genres from anime and international TV to classics, indie films and documentaries. Tubi reports millions of users and saw 9x growth in monthly active users in 2016 versus the prior year. Ads are limited compared with TV (about 4–5 minutes of commercials per 30 minutes of content), and advertisers have included brands such as Fox, Unilever and Amazon. The company has built an in-house TV analytics platform to A/B test and optimize content curation and ad targeting. Tubi is available across web, mobile, game consoles and streaming players and plans to use new funding to scale, hire engineering/product/data staff, and expand marketing and analytics efforts. Tubi TV operates a free, ad-supported streaming service available on mobile devices, gaming consoles, and streaming media players. The company aggregates licensed content from more than 200 partners and offers roughly 40,000 hours of movies and TV shows, with new titles added weekly. It monetizes via direct and programmatic advertising, with ad breaks ranging from 15 seconds to two minutes and proprietary tech to avoid interrupting dialog. The app has been installed over 20 million times and attracts “millions” of monthly active users who spend over an hour per session; its audience grew over 400% year-to-date. Tubi TV is not yet profitable but is growing rapidly and plans to expand its team—already about 40 people, which tripled in the prior six months—with hires in engineering and marketing. Strategic investments from studios may enable expanded licensing options, though the company has not disclosed specific future plans.

Participated · Seed · May 2015

Mobcrush, founded in 2014 and based in Santa Monica, CA, is a mobile-first live streaming platform that enables on-device game broadcasting from iOS and Android. The company completed a $20M Series B and has raised $35.9M in total since founding. The round was led by Los Angeles-based Evolution Media with participation from Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, Raine Ventures, Lowercase Capital, First Round Capital and others. Mobcrush plans to use the funds to grow active users and hire more engineers. Its free app (Apple App Store and Google Play) lets gamers broadcast mobile gameplay, watch live and on-demand mobile gaming videos, and chat with other players. Engagement highlights include Critical Ops generating more than 5,000 broadcasts and over 2 million minutes watched on the platform prior to the game’s release. Mobcrush is a mobile video streaming company that enables mobile users to broadcast, watch and chat about games as they play and stream in real time. Based in Santa Monica, California, the company offers a one‑tap mobile game streaming solution that requires no additional equipment or software. At the time of the article Mobcrush was in beta for iOS and MacOSX with Android and Windows coming soon and planned a full cross‑platform launch in the coming months. The company has been building community and content partnerships (for example, an exclusive arrangement with TouchArcade) and hired industry experts from Google Play, Apple App Store and Xbox to grow engagement and partnerships, plus influencers producing regular streams. Mobcrush said it will use the funding to accelerate its mission of supporting, entertaining and connecting the world’s 1 billion mobile gamers. Financially, the company reported raising more than $11M in the Series A and stated it has raised more than $15M in total from backers including KPCB, Raine, First Round, Lowercase, CrunchFund, Lionsgate, Advancit, CAA and others. Mobcrush is a mobile video streaming company that enables mobile users to broadcast, watch and chat about games as they play and stream in real-time. The platform is currently in private beta for iOS and Android and has gained early traction with mobile gaming guilds and players of Clash of Clans, Vainglory, Modern Combat and Minecraft. The team organized the first live mobile eSports tournament played and streamed natively from mobile devices. Mobcrush says it aims to support, entertain and connect the world’s one billion mobile gamers and to deliver innovation to the mobile gaming community. The company has raised $4.9M in seed funding to scale the platform. CEO Royce Disini and the team emphasize delivering value and building community-focused streaming, competitions and tournaments.