Berlin-headquartered football media platform, OneFootball, has announced that it has grabbed $300 million in Series D funding. This fresh investment round was led by blockchain fund Liberty City Ventures. Also, the round saw participation from Animoca Brands that just invested in Argent, Dapper Labs, DAH Beteiligungs GmbH, Quiet Capital, RIT Capital Partners, Senator Investment Group and Alsara Investment Group.
Attains unicorn status
Reportedly, the latest financing round has taken the valuation of the company to over $1 billion, thereby making it a unicorn. Recently, we saw the mobile tax filing app Taxfix from Berlin attain the unicorn status after Grover and Choco from the city.
OneFootball will deploy the fresh funds to support its expansion efforts, and make investments in web3 companies.
As part of the round, co-founder and executive chairman of Animoca Brands, Yat Siu, joined the boards of OneFootball and OneFootball Labs.
“Over the last year, the sporting universe has made progress in harnessing the potential of NFTs and gaming, offering fans new digital experiences based on the important principles of true digital ownership and decentralisation,” said Siu in a statement. Animoca Brands is proud to have played a role in nearly every significant milestone in the development of true digital property rights via NFTs,” he added.
Blockchain and football
Now, OneFootball is taking another leap as it aims to offer accessible, affordable, and unique fan experiences that will drive mass adoption of blockchain technology in football.
Besides growth and expansion, the money will be used for the formation of OneFootball Labs, a new joint venture with Animoca Brands and Liberty City Ventures. It has rolled out a new joint venture to accelerate its expansion into Web3.
The OneFootball Labs will enable clubs, leagues, federations and players3 to release digital assets and fan-centric experiences based on blockchain technology. These products will be offered at different price points to make them widely accessible. Also, fans will be able to purchase and store digital collectibles with just their email and a credit card.
Platform for next-gen football fans
OneFootball was founded in 2018 by Lucas von Cranach with the goal to fuel the world’s football obsession. With over 100 million football fans worldwide every month, it is the most popular football media platform for the new generation of football fans.
It is the only app with a fully personalised home stream for non-stop news related to football, it offers live football matches in-app on a free and pay-per-view basis. OneFootball operates a 24-hour newsroom to provide fans across the world with the comprehensive football content they crave – from statistics and live scores of 200+ leagues and competitions worldwide to breaking news, highlight clips, live streaming, transfer rumours and features.
The German football platform is available in 12 languages and has regional offices in London, New York, Mexico City, Singapore, Cairo, Istanbul and Rio de Janeiro.
Acquisition of Dugout
In late 2020, the firm acquired Dugout to reshape the football digital media landscape. It also intended to form the world’s largest owned and operated digital football media business. The acquisition saw Arsenal, Barcelona, Bayern Munich, Chelsea, Juventus, Liverpool, Manchester City, Paris Saint-Germain, Real and Olympique de Marseille join OneFootball as shareholders.
Following the same, early last year, it welcomed three additional shareholders, including the German FA, Borussia Dortmund and Tottenham Hotspur.
