Gaming Startup Lysto Raises $12 Mn To Offer Digital Certification To Pro Gamers

Lysto, which issues digital credentials to gamers, has secured more than $12 Mn in its Pre-Series A funding round.   

Square Peg, BEENEXT, Hashed, Tiger Global and Better Capital have invested in the round. Besides, angel investors including Balaji Srinivasan (Ex-CTO, Coinbase), Paul Veradittakit from Pantera Capital, Binny Bansal and Bobby Ong & TM Lee from CoinGecko also took part. 

Lysto will use funds to develop its tech platform, scale business development activities and build tools for issuing digital credentials 

“We are excited by the interplay of gaming and crypto, especially when combined with this team’s unique credentials and their passion to bring crypto to the masses. The team is early in the journey yet has built out great capabilities in the space,” said Tushar Roy, partner at Square Peg.

Including the current fundraising, Lysto has raised a total of $15 Mn funding to date. 

Founded in 2021 by Sadiq Ahamed, Lysto builds APIs, NFTs and allied tools for online gamers. It primarily issues digital credentials to online gamers after they win an online tournament or game. Later on, these credentials are used in the form of NFTs that gamers can publish onto their social media profiles.

“Through PoPP and Passport, Lysto is enabling the gaming ecosystem to standardise gamer reputation. We envision a world where on-chain attestations across games and tournaments can form the basic building block of gamers’ profiles,” said Sadiq Ahamed, founder and CEO of Lysto.

Recently, Lysto claims to have launched Proof of Play Protocol (PoPP) which offers standardised gaming credentials to professional gamers in the industry. In essence, PoPPs are trophies, social badges and game-tester tokens that are issued by games and online tournaments. It can be shared with gamers via AirDrops, APIs and mails and later, gamers could put it on their public profile. 

In November 2021, Lysto secured $3 Mn in its seed funding round from BEENEXT, Better Capital, Cloud Capital and other investors. It claims to have increased its headcount to 25 employees since the last fundraising.

It competes with the likes of Alzheimer’s Research that issues gaming credentials to pro gamers. 

The number of online gamers in India has surged by 8% to 390 Mn in 2021. According to a KPMG report, India’s gaming market is projected to touch a $3.9 Bn mark by 2025.