🤑 Smart Money in Creator Economy - March 6 to March 12
Fundraising and exits of the #CreatorEconomy - what happened last week?
Hi, it’s Ange!
Welcome on 🤑 Smart Money in Creator Economy, the new format of Passion & Creator, the media hub about emerging trends in the exciting vertical of the Creator/Passion Economy.
Every week on Money flows in Creator Economy, receive the last fundraising and exits of the Creator Economy!
Dear investor friends, it’s time to pick new deal flow in it 🤩
Dear founders, discover who invest in this amazing vertical, and maybe in your (next) Creator Economy startup.. 😉!
Feel free to reach out if you’d like to share comments or questions. Don’t forget to like this post above and share it with your friends and colleagues.
😶 If the images are not displayed, press "Show blocked content" at the top left of this email.
Focus on the 🤖 AI-focused applications for creators & communities, and the niche of the “Celebrity-led masterclasses” 👨🏽🎤 this week, with at least $33.8M raised on 5 rounds!
🟪 Unitary (2019 / UK 🇬🇧)
#Community / #AI: building contextual AI, automating content moderation for “harmful content” on social media
Data volume-based revenue model - B2B customer approach
Raised a $8M Seed round
From the business angels Ian HOGARTH (Plural Platform) and Carolyn EVERSON (ex-Instacart’s President)
🟪 MentorShow (2019 / France 🇫🇷)
#EdTech / #Video: enabling celebrities to share their expertise through video masterclasses
Subscriptions revenue model - B2B/B2C/B2Creators customer approach
Raised a $16M Series B round
From the business angels Marc LEVY (La Maison de Gestion’s President), Frédéric MAZZELLA (ex-Blablacar founder, Captain Cause co-founder), Christophe ANDRE (Vynova Group’s CEO); the VC firms Educapital, All Irons Ventures, Left Lane Capital and the CVC firm Credit Mutuel Innovation.
🟪 Wildxyz (2022 / USA 🇺🇸)
#Art / #Web3 / #CreatorSupport: Experiential art platform & digital incubator for artists and collectors, with a embedded NFT marketplace
Transactions-volume based & Donations revenue model - B2C/B2Creators customer approach
Raised a $7M Seed round
From the lead VC firm Matrix Partners.
🟪 OthersideAI (HyperWrite) (2021 / USA 🇺🇸)
#AI / #Writing: Helping writers generates and improve their articles and blog posts with the AI writing assistant HypeWrite
Freemium revenue model - B2B/B2Creators customer approach
Raised a $2.8M Seed round
From the business angels Siqi CHEN (Runway Financial’s co-founder), Nick FROSST (Cohere’s co-founder), Ivan ZHANG (Cohere’s co-founder), Furqhan RYDHAN (thirdweb’s founder), Aidan GOMEZ (Cohere’s co-founder & CEO), ; and the VC firms Madrona, Cortical Ventures and Active Capital.
🟪 Wand (2022 / USA 🇺🇸)
#AI / #Art: Enables artists, from a handful of pictures from their portfolio, to nurture their AI & generate new pictures & digital art productions
Freemium revenue model - B2B/B2Creators customer approach
Raised an undisclosed Seed round
From the lead VC firm O’Shaughnessy Ventures.
We will find the new 5 deals with the other 48 listed deals of 2023, in the new Creator Economy deals database:
NB: I am currently on a last check on the deals of 2022. Once finished, you’ll have you access of all deals of 2022 (+480 deals, +470 companies, +590 investors and +20 buyers)!
Quick review about the first quarter of 2023.
Since January 1, the Creator Economy has exceeded the 1.5B mark in investment volume. This volume is highly driven by the Private Equity round of Kakao Entertainment, the South-Korean giant, enabling creators to stream their songs, and manages K-Pop artist careers, which has reach almost a billion dollars ($966M), on the management, cinema and music vertical.
Even if the 2023 funding represents the third of the 2022’s volume, it’s still a good first quarter for the Creator Economy, given that the context of the tech ecosystem (crypto winter, big tech layoffs, global slowdown of the VC investments …). The last year was highly driven by the “NFT hype”, gathering $2.1B of the VC funding, at this time.
So, the major tech trends impact highly the Creator Economy. The web3 hype is down, with only $176M in 2023. The AI-generative content solutions, with a deep focus about creators are below the radar for now, with $66M in 2023 distributed on solutions like Scenario, helping artists and game developers create their own AI-generated game assets, or Voicemod, enabling gamers & streamers to enhance the creator's regular voice through generative AI.
Also, there is a question: how to include the AI-generative trend within the Creator Economy, given that the existing solutions, ChatGPT as a flagship, have a generalist approach to address customer’s needs. Maybe it’s better to include in the Creator Economy landscape, only on AI-generative content genuinely focused on creator applications, such as picture & digital art generation? The question is opened.
🥇 Which are the most active investors in the gaming space?
Gaming is one of the hot space of the Creator Economy, with the gaming livestreaming, generating high millions of views for the best gamers, and contributing to the rise of e-sports; and the Web3 Gaming, developing new economics in the game, but still create debates about the sustainability of the revenue model. (If you’re curious about the Web3 gaming, you’ll find plenty of resources in the 📚 Passion & Creator Wiki by clicking here.)
It was the 2nd most funded vertical in 2023 with $2.8B invested in “creator-friendly” gaming companies, but it relevant to say that the web3 gaming side was the most appealed for the investors. Greatly due to the crypto winter, VC investors in “creator-friendly” gaming has become much weaker ($97M since the beginning of the year, vs $308M last year, at the same time). But the interest is sill here, with fundings in Web3 gaming solutions like digital fashion assets for games House of Blueberry, and new areas like AI-generative applications in gaming, such as PLAI Labs.
In this area, some specialists invest almost exclusively in these areas, so which and who are they?
Let’s see among the most active creator economy investors in 2022 and 2023, and which and who are the most focus on gaming.
📊 The Corporate VC firms
Animoca Brands: 35 creator economy deals | 48% focused on gaming
📈 The VC firms
Infinity Ventures Crypto: 15 deals | 47 % focused on gaming
Sfermion: 15 deals | 40 % focused on gaming
Coinbase Ventures : 12 deals | 50 % focused on gaming
Hashed: 12 deals | 75 % focused on gaming
Solana Ventures: 12 deals | 50 % focused on gaming
Play Ventures: 11 deals | 90 % focused on gaming
Bitkraft Ventures: 10 deals | 50 % focused on gaming
Griffin Gaming Partners: 10 deals | 100 % focused on gaming
Makers Fund: 10 deals | 90 % focused on gaming
Paradigm: 10 deals | 50 % focused on gaming
Morningstar Ventures: 8 deals | 50 % focused on gaming
Mechanism Capital: 7 deals | 43 % focused on gaming
Defiance Capital: 6 deals | 50 % focused on gaming
🏦 The Companies & DAOs
Polygons Studios: 10 deals | 60 % focused in gaming
Polygon: 8 deals | 63 % focused on gaming
Yield Guild Games: 8 deals | 50 % focused on gaming
Galaxy Interactive: 7 deals | 71 % focused on gaming
👥 The Business Angels
Kevin LIN (Twitch): 9 deals | 67 % focused on gaming
Justin KAN (Twitch): 5 deals | 80 % focused on gaming
Do KWON (TerraForm): 4 deals | 75 % focused on gaming
Gabby DIZON (Yield Guild Games): 4 deals | 75% % focused on gaming
Roham GHAREGOZLOU (Dapper Labs): 4 deals | 50 % focused on gaming
Thomas VU (Riot Games): 3 deals | 100 % focused on gaming
🖋 Want to know more info about these investors: click here to have access to the database
That’s it for today!
Do not hesitate to reach on Twitter or Linkedin if some content really touched your curiosity, or if you want to suggest your sources 😎
If you would like to have the next one in your inbox next week, subscribe to it 👇 :
If you like Passion & Creator and want to help it grow, please share it to your colleagues, followers and friends.
See you next time 🙋🏿♂️ !
Ange Michael AHYI