Former Nazara CEO’s web3 startup Kratos raises Rs 160 Cr in seed round

Web3 gaming venture Kratos Studios has scooped up Rs 160 crore ($20 million) in a seed round led by Accel with participation from investors including Prosus Ventures, Courtside Ventures, Nexus Venture Partners, Nazara and others.

The funding will help to build distribution rails in emerging markets for global Web3 games and the Decentralised Autonomous Organization (DAO) will also invest in the most promising Web3 games across the world, the company said in a press release.

According to the company, the seed money has been raised at a valuation of Rs 1,200 crore ($150 million). As a part of the transaction, Kratos Studios has also completed the acquisition of IndiGG through a token swap. Nazara has invested in this round with an intent to collaborate with IndiGG on the web3 front.

In fact, former Nazara Technologies' CEO Manish Aggarwal and angel investor Ishank Gupta are the co-founders of Kratos. The duo is building the web3 gaming DAO under the IndiGG brand.

The company further added that it will also continue to work closely with Polygon’s co-founder Sandeep Nailwal and Yield Guild Games (YGG)’s co-founder Gabby Dizon towards building the largest gaming DAO in the world.

IndiGG had secured $6 million in funding from Sequoia Capital India, Lightspeed Venture Partners, and others in January. It’s a blockchain based gaming community (DAO) which is building distribution rails in emerging markets for global Web3 games.

Amid funding winter, $20 million seed money is an eye popping number even if we consider early stage funding in the past couple of years. Moreover, a clutch of large financing rounds such as InsuranceDekho’s $150 million, FreshToHome’s $104 million, KreditBee’s $120 million, and PhonePe’s $450 million in the ongoing round have also come during the funding crunch in the startup ecosystem.