NFT-powered fantasy football platform Sorare is close to closing a funding round worth $532 million, according to Business Insider citing its own sources.
The valuation is expected to be at least $3.8 billion.
The round was led by Japanese telecommunications giant SoftBank, with other participants including European firms Atomico, Eurazeo and Blisce, a firm founded by French entrepreneur Alexandre Mars in the United States.
Sorare was founded in 2018. The platform allows users to buy, sell, and trade NFT cards of players from leading football clubs worldwide. The tokens are also used in virtual prize tournaments.
Among Sorare’s 142 partner clubs are the French «Paris Saint-Germain», the Italian «Juventus», the Russian «Spartak» and «Zenit».
Sorare CEO Nicolas Julia denied reports of a new funding round. In the previous one, led by venture firm Benchmark, the platform raised €40 million.
The Block founder Mike Dudas refused to believe that SoftBank would invest such a large sum in a company with a net annual profit of only $20 million.
if softbank is really paying close to $4 billion for sorare, which is doing maximum $150m in gross revenue and $20m in net revenue annually, we’ve all lost our goddamn minds
shut it all down, it’s pure insanity
— Mike Dudas (@mdudas) July 15, 2021
However, commenters noted that this concerns the fast-growing fantasy-sports and NFT sectors. They also recalled that SoftBank’s earlier investments, such as in Grab or WeWork, had prompted similar bewilderment.
The deal in 2014 attracted $250 million from the Japanese giant, which remains the largest investment ever made in an internet company in Southeast Asia. Grab, based in Malaysia, is now valued at $3 billion.
American WeWork posted profits of $3.2 billion in 2020, and SoftBank’s stake in the company stands at 80%.
Earlier in July, SoftBank invested $200 million in Mercado Bitcoin, the operator of Brazil’s largest cryptocurrency exchange.
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