MUMBAI: Rario, creators of the world's first cricket NFT platform, has mopped up USD 120 million (about Rs 914 crore) in Series-A funding round led by Dream Capital, the corporate venture capital arm of Dream Sports, and Alpha Wave Capital.
Rario claims to have the largest share of cricket NFT (non-fungible token) rights globally through exclusive partnerships with six international cricket leagues and a roster of over 900 cricketers.
With Dream Capital's investment, Rario now gets access to Dream Sports' 140 million users, who will be offered FIAT-only products, the company said in a statement on Thursday.
Alpha Wave Global, previously Falcon Edge Capital, also participated in the round, and now joins existing investors Animoca Brands, which is a global leader in web3 gaming, Presight Capital, and Kingsway Capital, the statement added.
Founded in 2021 by IIT Delhi alumni Ankit Wadhwa and Sunny Bhanot, Rario recently signed one of the world's largest cricket NFT deals in a multi-year exclusive partnership with Cricket Australia and the Australian Cricketers' Association to create an Australian cricket metaverse of collectibles and gaming.
Rario enables fans to engage as a community, giving them a chance to own a piece of cricket history through digital collectibles across player cards, video moments and cricket artefacts.
Through Rario, sports fans can buy, sell, and trade NFTs through FIAT-only mediums - credit cards, debit cards, and bank transfers. Rario has sold over 50,000 NFTs to sports fans across 20 countries with the US, Britain, Australia and India as its top four markets.
Dream Capital was launched in 2020 and invests in sports, gaming, and fitness-tech startups. With Rario, Dream Capital's portfolio grows to nine companies and marks the foray of Dream Sports into the web3 space.
This is currently the largest investment by Dream Capital, and also the single largest investment in the cricket NFT space globally.
Ankit Wadhwa, co-founder & chief executive of Rario said, their global cricket NFT ecosystem will be further strengthened by the 140 million sports fans on Dream Sports.
Rario is a digital collectible platform for cricket fans to collect and trade officially licensed cricket moments on the blockchain, represented as a non-fungible token. Having Polygon Studios and Animoca as partners, Rario is built on the Polygon Network by a top-notch team and is backed by reputed investors such as Kingsway Capital and Presight Capital.