Axie Infinity maker Sky Mavis has raised Series B funding led by the noted American venture capital firm Andreesen Horowitz. Axie Infinity is one of the most successful NFT games where people can earn rewards simply by playing that can be traded for real world money. Sky Mavis raised $152 million (roughly Rs. 1,134 crores) from at least six crypto and blockchain investors in its Series B round. Founded in 2019, the gaming studio shot to fame after its game Axie Infinity went viral. The game allows players to collect and battle cute and fierce virtual pets called Axies. Players can earn cryptocurrencies via this game as well.
Earlier in September, a Business Insider report had claimed that the San Francisco, US-based VC firm was establishing a new fund pool – exclusively for gaming start-ups.
Andreessen Horowitz’s investment Sky Mavis comes at a time when the gaming company’s valuation has inched closer to $3 billion (roughly Rs. 22,377 crores). In addition, the native crypto token of Axie Infinity game called “AXS” touched an all-time high of over $155 (roughly Rs. 11,500) on October 4. The AXS token is built on the Ethereum blockchain technology.
The craze around NFTs has been witnessing a boom on the global level. NFTs are digital assets representing real-world objects like art, music, in-game items, and videos among other unique stuff that can be bought using cryptocurrencies. The game Axie Infinity offers adorable virtual monsters that can be purchased as NFTs or won through gameplay.
As per a report by VentureBeat.com, an average transaction for an Axie Infinity NFT is worth around $420 (roughly Rs. 31,319). As of September 16, over 615,000 NFT traders had bought or sold Axie Infinity NFTs in 4.88 million transactions, the report said.
Accel, Paradigm, Standard Crypto, as well as Fabric Ventures, and Samsung Next are among other companies that extended funds to Sky Mavin in this round.
The decision of Andreessen Horowitz to invest in this NFT game-making brand comes just days after a top US official clarified that the country was not planning on banning cryptocurrencies or crypto-related activities.
In the last week of September, US Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell reaffirmed to the crypto sector saying that the central bank has no intentions on banning digital assets.