ZEBEDEE has closed on a $35 million Series B funding round, according to a company statement. The funding was led by Kingsway Capital and merchant bank The Raine Group as well as video-game giant Square Enix. Existing investors participating include Lakestar and Initial Capital.
ZEBEDEE is a “next-generation payment processor for the gaming industry.” The platform powers instant global payments of any size for any game or application using the Bitcoin Lightning Network. The service is programmable and developers may incorporate trigger payments that are sent instantly at almost no cost. ZEBEDEE can provide micropayments. In fact, the average size of the transaction is just $0.08, and nano-payments as small as $0.0002 are currently supported.
ZEBEDEE offers both API-based tools for developers as well as an app for gamers. The company notes that Bitcoin is just the payment rails that facilitates these transactions.
ZEBEDEE reports that its user count increased by over 10x since the startup announced its series A round in September 2021. The company did not provice detailed user and transaction data.
Simon Cowell, CEO of ZEBEDEE, said they are pleased to be in the position they are:
“This funding round gives us the ability to meet our highly ambitious roadmap both in terms of building out our infrastructure to support the hundreds of millions of users that play our partners’ games, as well as hire the top-level talent needed to ensure every partner has the best possible experience working with ZEBEDEE.”
Afonso Campos, Managing Partner at Kingsway Capital, added:
“Partnering with ZEBEDEE will allow its entire ecosystem to benefit from higher user retention, lower transaction costs and generally a superior payments experience. Importantly, it will also help bring Bitcoin to millions around the globe.”
Kenny Lee, Vice President at Raine Group, explained they see a “truly powerful use case for cryptocurrency in games:”
“We have seen new monetization methods disrupt the gaming industry in the past, and we believe the integration of Bitcoin directly into games is a new way to expand the connection with players and engage them in ways that were never possible before. The wide range of use cases for ZEBEDEE’s platform provides flexibility for the game designer and allows ZEBEDEE to partner with any developer, from AAA console and PC to hyper-casual mobile.”