Africa Web3 games publisher Carry1st raises $27M
Mobile games publisher Carry1st has closed a $27 million funding round to advance its publishing and digital content creation platform in Africa — a region its backers say is ripe for Web3 adoption.
The $27 million funding round was led by Bitkraft Ventures with additional participation from Andreessen Horowitz, also known as a16z. TTV Capital, Konvoy, Alumni Ventures, Lateral Capital and Kepple Ventures also participated in the funding round.
The latest deal came a year after Carry1st secured $20 million in funding supported by a16z and Google-parent Alphabet. At the time, Carry1st said the funding would go toward expanding internal capacity and growing its content portfolio. This included exploring Web3 play-to-earn gaming and the integration of nonfungible tokens into the gaming experience.
A spokesperson for Carry1st told Cointelegraph that the latest funding will be used to expand the capabilities of Pay1st, the company's monetization-as-a-service platform, which allows third-party publishers to make more money in Africa.
As a game publisher, Carry1st provides a full-stack solution for monetizing and managing mobile games on the African continent. In 2022, the company partnered with Los Angeles-based Riot Games, the creator of League of Legends, to pilot local payments for its gaming titles in Africa.
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