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XIt's Not the Game, It's Who You Play It With. Gamelancer Brings the Gig Economy to Gaming
Sam primarily covers entertainment and media for dot.LA. Previously he was Marjorie Deane Fellow at The Economist, where he wrote for the business and finance sections of the print edition. He has also worked at the XPRIZE Foundation, U.S. Government Accountability Office, KCRW, and MLB Advanced Media (now Disney Streaming Services). He holds an MBA from UCLA Anderson, an MPP from UCLA Luskin and a BA in History from University of Michigan. Email him at samblake@dot.LA and find him on Twitter @hisamblake

- L.A.-based Gamelancer, a two-sided platform to match top-tier gamers and personalities with users searching for teammates, launches Tuesday.
- The founders, Razvan Romanescu and Darren Lopes, have raised $800,000 to build the platform and hope to begin a new round within 90 days.
- Gamelancer offers gaming talent new ways to make money and users the opportunity to make sure their teammates aren't duds
Nine times out of ten, it seemed, Razvan Romanescu and Darren Lopes got unlucky. The online video game algorithms that matched them up with random teammates kept pairing them with duds: an "eleven-year-old with a broken microphone", for example, or "someone with no social skills." Conversely, the rare gem who played well and had an appealing personality made playing video games a lot more fun. Indeed, such rockstar teammates were the sort Romanescu and Lopes would pay to have on their team.
That's just what their new venture, launched Tuesday, enables.
Gamelancers are freelance gamers who are vetted by the company and who set their own price and availability for users to book them. Users can also set up their own requests – "Looking to pay someone $10 to help me level up my Fortnite skills," for instance – which the 'gamelancers' can claim. This two-sided marketplace is an opportunity, the founders say, to fill "a huge gap in the gaming space."
In addition to taking 30% of the transaction, Gamelancer's business model will also include advertising and ecommerce. The founders expect the average price to be set around $7 per hour.
Prior to making a stealthy beta version available earlier this month, the L.A.-based company had already gained 6 million social media followers. With 16 full-time employees, it has since registered about 6,000 users and approved 250 gamelancers.
Gamelancer raised $800,000 in a seed round led by New York-based Mayfair Global Ventures. The founders now plan to arm themselves with data to demonstrate growth in preparation for a bigger round, which they hope to begin within 90 days.
The company has attracted some notable talent to join its executive ranks. John Monopoly, who formerly managed Missy Elliot and 2020 presidential hopeful Kanye West (maybe?), is Gamelancer's Head of Talent. His job will be to attract notable names to the platform.
One of the founders' early tenets in forming the company was that "it's not the game you're playing; it's who you're playing with."
Users may want to link up with gamelancers for reasons that have nothing to do with the game itself, they noted. People may want to book notable personalities to simply socialize with while collaborating on a butt-kicking rampage, for example.
Gamelancer, which the founders say has 10 patent-pending technologies after having built its platform from scratch, has also brought in a former Uber marketer as its head of growth and a former Netflix product manager as its head of product.
The two founders themselves have track records of building businesses by cultivating big followings on social media, including Guff Media – a content company that claims to reach 500 million people a month – and 10PM Curfew – a fashion and beauty network that says it reaches over 500 million women per month across Instagram and TikTok.
"We know how to keep users engaged and give them a user experience," Romanescu told dot.LA.
Now they turn their efforts to gaming, one of their passions, with a grand vision.
"We coined the term 'gamelancer' to be something as big as 'streaming,'" Romanescu said. "We're confident people will say, 'I'm a gamelancer for a living'."
For the record: An earlier version of this story incorrectly stated that Mayfair Ventures was the lead seed investor. The lead investor was Mayfair Global Ventures.
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Sam primarily covers entertainment and media for dot.LA. Previously he was Marjorie Deane Fellow at The Economist, where he wrote for the business and finance sections of the print edition. He has also worked at the XPRIZE Foundation, U.S. Government Accountability Office, KCRW, and MLB Advanced Media (now Disney Streaming Services). He holds an MBA from UCLA Anderson, an MPP from UCLA Luskin and a BA in History from University of Michigan. Email him at samblake@dot.LA and find him on Twitter @hisamblake
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This Week in ‘Raises’: Improvado Hauls $22M, Clearlake Launches $14B Fund
Kristin Snyder is an editorial intern for dot.la. She previously interned with Tiger Oak Media and led the arts section for UCLA's Daily Bruin.
This week in “Raises”: A pair of Web3 platforms for gamers landed funding, as did a Manhattan Beach medical startup looking to bolster primary care via nurse practitioners. Meanwhile, a Santa Monica-based investment firm launched its seventh fund with more than $14 billion in dry powder.
Venture Capital
Improvado, a marketing data aggregation platform, raised $22 million in a Series A funding round led by Updata Partners.
Web3 gaming platform FreshCut raised $15 million in funding led by Galaxy Interactive, Animoca Brands and Republic Crypto.
Medical startup Greater Good Health raised $10 million in a funding round led by LRVHealth.
Joystick, a Web3 platform for gamers and creators, raised $8 million in seed funding.
Open source data protection company CipherMode Labs raised $6.7 million in seed funding led by Innovation Endeavors .
Mobile phone charging network ChargeFUZE raised $5 million in seed funding led by Beverly Pacific, TR Ventures, VA2, Jason Goldberg and Al Weiss.
Polygon, a startup aiming to better diagnose children with learning disabilities, raised $4.2 million in seed and pre-seed funding led by Spark Capital and Pear VC.
Pique, a virtual women's sexual health clinic, raised $4 million in a seed funding round led by Maveron.
Psudo, a sneaker startup that utilizes recycled water bottles and 3D sublimation printing to create its shoes, raised $3 million in a seed funding round led by SternAegis Ventures.
Funds
Santa Monica-based investment firm Clearlake Capital Group raised $14.1 billion for its seventh flagship fund.
Raises is dot.LA’s weekly feature highlighting venture capital funding news across Southern California’s tech and startup ecosystem. Please send fundraising news to Kristin Snyder (kristinsnyder@dot.la).Kristin Snyder is an editorial intern for dot.la. She previously interned with Tiger Oak Media and led the arts section for UCLA's Daily Bruin.
LA Tech ‘Moves’: New Head of Originals at Snap, New President at FaZe Clan
Kristin Snyder is an editorial intern for dot.la. She previously interned with Tiger Oak Media and led the arts section for UCLA's Daily Bruin.
“Moves”, our roundup of job changes in L.A. tech, is presented by Interchange.LA, dot.LA's recruiting and career platform connecting Southern California's most exciting companies with top tech talent. Create a free Interchange.LA profile here—and if you're looking for ways to supercharge your recruiting efforts, find out more about Interchange.LA's white-glove recruiting service by emailing Sharmineh O’Farrill Lewis (sharmineh@dot.la). Please send job changes and personnel moves to moves@dot.la.
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FaZe Clan brought on Zach Katz as the gaming and media company’s new president and chief operating officer. Katz was previously the chief executive officer of the music tech investment fund Raised in Space Enterprises.
TikTok brand factory LINK Agency promoted Dustin Poteet to chief creative officer. Poteet was previously creative director at the firm.
Livestream shopping platform Talkshoplive hired Tradesy co-founder John Hall as its chief technology officer. Universal Music Group Nashville's former vice president of digital marketing, Tony Grotticelli, also joins the company as vice president of marketing.
Anjuli Millan will take over as head of original content at Snap after three years of overseeing production for the division.
Tech and media company Blavity hired Nikki Crump as general manager of agency. Crump joins the company from Burrell Communications Group.
O'Neil Digital Solutions, which provides customer communications and experience management for the health care industry, hired Eric Ramsey as national account sales executive. Ramsey joins from T/O Printing.
Investment firm Cresset Partners named Tammy Funasaki as managing director of business development. Funasaki previously served as head of investor relations for Breakwater Management.
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Kristin Snyder is an editorial intern for dot.la. She previously interned with Tiger Oak Media and led the arts section for UCLA's Daily Bruin.
Snapchat’s New Controls Could Let Parents See Their Kids’ Friend Lists
Christian Hetrick is dot.LA's Entertainment Tech Reporter. He was formerly a business reporter for the Philadelphia Inquirer and reported on New Jersey politics for the Observer and the Press of Atlantic City.
Snapchat is preparing to roll out enhanced parental controls that would allow parents to see who their teenagers are chatting with on the social media app, according to screenshots of the upcoming feature.
Snap’s parental controls.
Courtesy of Watchful.
Snapchat is planning to introduce Family Center, which would allow parents to see who their children are friends with on the app and who they’ve messaged within the last seven days, according to screenshots provided by Watchful, a product intelligence company. Parents would also be able help their kids report abuse or harassment.
The parental controls are still subject to change before finally launching publicly, as the Family Center screenshots—which were first reported by TechCrunch—reflect features that are still under development.
Santa Monica-based Snap and other social media giants have faced mounting criticism for not doing more to protect their younger users—some of whom have been bullied, sold deadly drugs and sexually exploited on their platforms. State attorneys general have urged Snap and Culver City-based TikTok to strengthen their parental controls, with both companies’ apps especially popular among teens.
A Snap spokesperson declined to comment on Friday. Previously, Snap representatives have told dot.LA that the company is developing tools that will provide parents with more insight into how their children are engaging on Snapchat and allow them to report troubling content.
Yet Snap’s approach to parental controls could still give teens some privacy, as parents wouldn’t be able to read the actual content of their kids’ conversations, according to TechCrunch. (The Family Center screenshots seen by dot.LA do not detail whether parents can see those conversations).
In addition, teenage users would first have to accept an invitation from their parents to join the in-app Family Center before those parents can begin monitoring their social media activity, TechCrunch reported.
Christian Hetrick is dot.LA's Entertainment Tech Reporter. He was formerly a business reporter for the Philadelphia Inquirer and reported on New Jersey politics for the Observer and the Press of Atlantic City.