Supporting Matchday’s $21 million seed round, Lionel Messi’s Play Time venture capital firm is backing this exciting web3 football game startup.
In Brief
Matchday is in the process of crafting web3 football games that are officially licensed by FIFA.
Sebastien de Halleux, who has been appointed as chief gaming officer at Matchday, previously held a significant role at Electronic Arts.
The company is on track to launch its inaugural game, titled Matchday Squad, by the second quarter of this year.
In its recent funding round, Matchday, which focuses on developing web3 football games, raised $21 million with support from several backers including Lionel Messi’s Play Time, Courtside Ventures, Greylock, HackVC, Capricorn Investment Group, and Horizons Ventures.
The goal of the company is to provide casual football gaming experiences for an estimated '5 billion fans', incorporating web3 features like NFT digital trading cards. Last November, they formed multi-year agreements with FIFA and FIFPRO for game licensing. Notably, Alexia Putellas, a two-time Ballon d’Or Feminin and UEFA Women’s Player of the Year, became the firm’s founding global ambassador and advisor.
The first game titled 'Matchday Squad' is set to debut in the second quarter of this year. Players will have the opportunity to challenge one another using player cards, with new users receiving a complimentary starter deck.
Sebastien de Halleux, who co-founded Matchday and serves as the Chief Gaming Officer, emphasized the intention to give every fan a voice and genuine ownership in the gaming experience. 'Our free-to-play model revolves around Matchday cards featuring real football players, fostering an incredible community of football aficionados,' he remarked.
To build engagement for their platform, the company previously launched a mini-game dubbed Matchday Challenge: FIFA World Cup Qatar 2022™ Edition, distributing 2 million NFT player cards among almost 600,000 players, alongside exclusive FIFA World Cup Genesis card releases.
Sebastien de Halleux has an impressive background, previously working as the VP of Business Development & Strategic Partnerships at Electronic Arts. Additionally, he co-founded and served as COO of Playfish, a prominent social video game company that was acquired by EA in 2009.
Messi has been actively pursuing significant ventures in the web3 domain. Before investing in Matchday, he became an investor and brand ambassador for Sorare. Moreover, he secured a $20 million agreement to endorse Socios, a platform for digital fan tokens.
Simultaneously, the football sector is increasingly diving into the web3 sphere to take advantage of the rising market for sports memorabilia. Sorare has reached a hefty valuation of $4.3 billion and recently established NFT partnerships with the Premier League, La Liga, Bundesliga, and AC Milan. raised $680 million Additionally, collaborations with Upland are underway to integrate football into the metaverse.
Last November, FIFA partnered with Altered State Machine In August, fundraising efforts in the metaverse highlighted trends in gaming, decentralized autonomous organizations (DAOs), and NFTs.
Read more:
Disclaimer
In line with the Trust Project guidelines Cindy contributes to the Metaverse Post as a journalist, focusing on web3, NFTs, the metaverse, and AI topics, with a special emphasis on interviews with key figures in the Web3 sector. Hailing from Singapore and currently residing in Tbilisi, Georgia, she has a decade of journalism experience and holds a Bachelor’s degree in Communications & Media Studies from the University of South Australia.
