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- California-based developer Manticore Games secured $30M USD funding in a Series B investment for its upcoming product, an online game creator platform.
- The financing was raised from returning investors from Manticore’s Series A in 2017, Benchmark, BITKRAFT Esports Ventures, Correlation Ventures, and SV Angel, in addition to new investors M Ventures, Arrive, Sapphire Sport, and Tuesday Capital.
- The company was founded in 2016 by two industry veterans, Frederic Descamps and Jordan Maynard.
U.S. game developer Manticore Games raised a $30M Series B investment to launch an online game creator platform, Core. The Series B financing includes investments from Benchmark Capital, Correlation Ventures, BITKRAFT Esports Ventures, M Ventures, Arrive (a subsidiary of Roc Nation), Sapphire Sport, Tuesday Capital, and SV Angel.
Manticore Games will use the money to launch its latest product called Core. Which the company’s Co-Founder and CEO Frederic Descamps described as “a digital playground service.” The product is not yet ready for launch but is expected to be a tool for game developers to create and publish multiplayer games.
“Most of the greatest esports games to date originate from within the community. It was passionate gamers creating new game modes and seeding entire new genres that became massive accelerants for esports growth. Those tools the community had available for creation and modding in the past have not been keeping up and evolving. Manticore Games is building a platform that provides next-generation game creation tools, allowing anyone to build TripleA quality games on the PC platform and make them available instantly for massive online multiplay,” said Jens Hilgers, founding partner of BITKRAFT Esports Ventures in an emailed response to The Esports Observer. “We strongly believe that Manticore’s CORE platform enables the community to unleash their creative potential and spawn new generations of genres and innovation in game mechanics.”
The company was founded by industry veterans Frederic Descamps and Jordan Maynard, whose experience includes making games and running services at companies such as EA, Zynga, Xfire, Trion Worlds, and A Bit Lucky.
In December 2017, Manticore Games secured a $15M Series A investment led by Benchmark Capital. Other investors in the previous round included BITKRAFT Esports Ventures, Correlation Ventures, CrunchFund, Macro Ventures, and SV Angel.
Furthermore, several investors participating in the round have previously invested in companies within the esports ecosystem. BITKRAFT Esports Ventures is the most active investor in the esports industry with more than 20 investments made including the recent $17M funding round in streaming network VENN led by the fund. Benchmark invested in League of Legends creator Riot Games in 2008 and 2009. Macro Ventures took part in a 2017 investment round in esports organization G2 Esports. SV Angel participated in a 2017 funding round in esports management platform Guilded.M Ventures made three investments during 2018 adding audience monetization platform FanAI, developer Gamelynx, and gaming entertainment portal Omnislash to its portfolio.
