Catch Up With This Week's Startup News With Our Video Recap
Lots happened in the L.A. tech and startup community this week. dot.LA chief host and correspondent Kelly O'Grady takes you through the key stories:
- COVID: iFoster Helps Save Semester for Foster Youth, UCLA Projects Economy Will Take 3 Years to Recover
- Media: Cameo CEO Talks Disrupting Entertainment Industry, Atom Tickets Optimistic About Movie Theaters' Future
- Startups: 'Anti-Superficial' Dating App S'More Launches in L.A., Relativity Space Gains West Coast Launch Site
- HelloOffice Bets on Returning to Offices with $20M Series A
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- Los Angeles' Tech and Startup Scene is Growing. - dot.LA ›
- Catch Up With This Week's Startup News in Our Weekly Video Recap ›
- Los Angeles Tech and Startup Week in Review - dot.LA ›
- Catch Up With This Week's Startup News in Our Weekly Video Recap ›
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Shawn Gunn has been waiting for gaming to get to this moment for 20 years.
He ran e-tournaments from his college dorm in the 1990s, long before esports exploded. Since then, Gunn has worked on Wall Street as a trader, at Nokia as the head of monetization and at HERE Technologies, before founding his first company, GUNN Inc, in 2008.
All the while, he watched as video games became lucrative for top competitors. And he decided to find a way to make them profitable for average gamers like himself.
Last year, Gunn founded PLLAY Labs Inc. with Christine Krzyzanowski. The video game wagering app lets users play video games like Fortnite and Call of Duty against each other for money. Since its launch in June, PLLAY has added 10,000 users, bringing its total user base to 60,000.
Skill-Based Betting
<p>PLLAY uses an artificial intelligence-driven platform to monitor video game matches, detect cheating and guarantee payment to winners. It is not considered gambling under federal law because players make bets on their own performance in a skill-based game.</p><p>Gunn said there is already a lot of peer-to-peer betting happening online, with or without the app. The wagering is often informal and done through game chats, with no guarantee the other player will send money via CashApp or PayPal. PLLAY ensures that each player is paid appropriately from pooled money that PLLAY secures in escrow.</p><p>PLLAY's background check process also ensures wagering laws in users' states are honored and confirms users are 18 or older.<br></p><p>Beal — a PLLAY investor, two-time NBA All-Star and shooting guard for the Washington Wizards — is a gamer off the court and away from his day job, as is Easterling.</p><p>"They're both gamers, in their own regard, and they fit our profile. So they're not professional gamers, obviously, they have other really cool day jobs," said Gunn. "But they know how big the gaming market is and where it's going."</p><p>Gunn said he sought out high net-worth investors that were passionate about gaming.</p><p>"I'm not just investing in a product; I'm investing in people. I believe in supporting minority- and women-owned businesses," said Beal in a statement, adding that Gunn and Krzyzanowski "have built more than a gaming platform, they've built a diverse and creative culture at PLLAY that fuels their vision."<br></p>Every year has defining moments, but no one could have predicted the world changing and paradigm shifting developments that have taken place over the course of the past year. They include combatting COVID-19, working from home, waves of social unrest, emerging technologies and more.
Join us Wednesday, December 16th at 11:00 a.m. PT for the closing dot.LA Strategy Session of the year as we reflect on L.A.'s emerging tech trends, challenges and predictions for 2021.
Upfront Managing Partner Mark Suster and dot.LA Senior Finance Reporter Ben Bergman will kick off the event with a one on one conversation. More speakers to be announced.
Register here - space is limited!
Mark Suster, Managing Partner at Upfront
Mark Suster, Managing Partner at Upfront
<p><br>Mark Suster has been a managing partner at Upfront since 2007, where has led notable investments in companies including Bird, Invoca, Density, Nanit, and Maker Studios (acquired by Disney). He previously was the founder & CEO of two successful enterprise software companies, the most recent of which was sold to Salesforce.com, where Mark became VP of products. Prior to being a founder, Mark was a software developer at Accenture while living and worked in Europe, Japan and the U.S. Mark is a graduate of UCSD and has an MBA from the University of Chicago.</p>Ben Bergman, dot.LA Senior Reporter
Ben Bergman, dot.LA Senior Reporter
<p>Ben Bergman is the newsroom's senior finance reporter. Previously he was a senior reporter/host at KPCC, a producer at Gimlet Media and NPR and produced two investigative documentaries for KCET. He has been a frequent on-air contributor to NPR and Marketplace and has written for The New York Times. Bergman was a 2017-2018 Knight-Bagehot Fellow in Economic and Business Journalism at Columbia Business School. He enjoys skiing, playing poker and cheering on The Seattle Seahawks.</p>- Investing in Uncertain Times: How VCs and COVID-19 - dot.LA ›
- Mark Suster of Upfront Ventures on VC's Primary Job - dot.LA ›
- Why NYC and SF Tech Workers are Moving to LA - dot.LA ›
- Los Angeles' Tech and Startup Scene is Growing. - dot.LA ›
Virgin Orbit announced plans for its second attempt to shoot its LauncherOne rocket into orbit on Dec. 19 carrying with it small NASA research satellites. The first attempt failed in May after a propellant line ruptured after the first-stage ignition.
The Richard Branson-founded company said it's run a list of tests and upgraded various systems in advance of next month's launch.