Exclusive: Animoca-backed NFT startup scores $120m in Dream Capital-led round

Dream Capital, the corporate VC arm of sports tech company Dream Sports, is the latest to join the Web3 fray after leading a US$120 million series A round of Rario, a Singapore-based cricket NFT platform.

Alpha Wave Global also participated in the fundraise.

Rario co-founders (from left) Ankit Wadhwa and Sunny Bhanot/ Photo credit: Rario

Speaking to Tech in Asia, Dev Bajaj, Dream Sports’ chief strategy officer, said the investment is the VC arm’s largest one to date and gives the company a minority stake in Rario.

Ankit Wadhwa and Sunny Bhanot, two graduates of the Indian Institute of Technology Delhi, established Rario in 2021. Wadhwa co-founded and sold a Middle East-based marketplace called Wadi.com, while Bhanot was the CTO of the same firm.

Rario is a fiat-only NFT platform where people can buy cricket digital collectibles such as player cards, video moments, and artifacts. Fans can buy, sell, and trade NFTs using credit cards, debit cards, and bank transfers.

The startup targets the Indian diaspora, and one-third of its users come from India, Wadhwa told Tech in Asia.

Recently, Rario closed an NFT deal with Cricket Australia and the Australian Cricketers’ Association for a multiyear exclusive partnership to launch a cricket-focused metaverse of games and collectibles. Since 2021, the startup has sold more than 50,000 NFTs to fans across 20 countries, with the UK, US, Australia, and India among the top-selling markets.

The company plans to use the funds to forge more partnerships with cricket boards and cricketer professions going ahead. Rario also aims to use the proceeds from NFT sales to create more platforms such as games in which its NFTs can be used.

Rario’s sizable fundraise comes as another cricket NFT startup scored investments: FanCraze secured US$100 million in a series A round in March.

A strategic move into Web3

With Rario, Dream Capital now has as many as nine startups in its portfolio, which include well-known names like FanCode and Fittr.

Set up in 2020, Dream Capital makes multistage investments with ticket sizes averaging from US$1 million to US$100 million. In August 2021, it set aside a corpus of US$250 million to invest in startups specializing in sports, gaming, and fitness tech.

The Rario investment appears to be more strategic for Dream Capital as it may bring the former’s Web3 prowess to other portfolio companies.

“There should be synergy across the portfolio,” Dream Sports’ Bajaj told Tech in Asia.

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