Playkey raises $10.5m through cryptocurrency sale
Russian streaming platform attracts new investors through Initial Coin Offering
Another games firm has turned to cryptocurrency as a means of securing funds for its ongoing development.
Playkey is a Russian games streaming platform and recently held an Initial Coin Offering, in which it sold its own proprietary cryptocurrency PKT. An ICO works similarly to an Initial Public Offering, but instead of shares the item sold are virtual tokens for use in-game (or, in this case, on the platform).
The firm released 100 million PKT tokens and made 60% of these available for sale. By the time the ICO had concluded, Playkey had earned over $10.5m.
The majority of token buyers were private investments, but three investment funds - Uncharted Capital, Allrise and G2H2 Capital - each bought over one million dollars worth of PKT.
According to a statement, Playkey CEO Egor Gurjev says the money raised will go toward "developing [our] P2P model and expanding into the American and Asian markets."
CTO Alexey Lykov offered more info on how PKT will be used: "In the long run the value of Playkey Tokens will be determined by market forces. Needless to say, the Playkey Foundation will make its own corrections as the managing entity.
"Within the framework of our business model we assume that the demand for PKT will increase over time. At first the tokens will be used to pay for playtime on the service, but eventually they will also be used to make in-game purchases, etc. We're going to motivate players to use PKT more often, and we are optimistic about the growth of the cryptocurrency's value in the long term."
Earlier this year, Reality Gaming Group raised $3.5m via an ICO for their augmented reality mobile shooter Reality Clash. We later spoke to the firm about what developers need to know about cryptocurrency fundraising.