Rakuten Capital, the investment arm of Japanese giant Rakuten Group, has made a minority investment in Digital Entertainment Asset (DEA), a Singapore-based global Web3 entertainment startup, according to an announcement.
Financial details of the investment were not disclosed but it was part of the collaborative deal between DEA and Rakuten Group. DEA also partnered with TV Tokyo Corp.
DEA operates the PlayMining NFT gaming platform, which pays out royalties of both official and fan art, paired with an NFT gaming platform featuring both in-house and third-party games that can each have their own token ecosystem. The startup said over S$9 million ($6.5 million) in royalties have already been paid out to creators to date.
The deal will see DEA collaborate with Rakuten and TV Tokyo Corp in the Web3 space, develop next-gen NFT/GameFi content, and create educational content for the promotion of Web3 initiatives to mainstream audiences, according to the announcement.
DEA’s PlayMining has over 2.5 million users in more than 100 countries as of October 2022. Its DEAPcoin token is Japan’s first and currently only P2E token approved by the country’s Financial Service Agency.
Rakuten Capital, launched in 2014, invests and operational support to its portfolio companies worldwide. It has invested globally in more than 70 companies, including Careem, Carousell, GoTo, Lyft, Pinterest, and Upstart.
SOUTHEAST ASIA DEAL MONITOR
DealStreetAsia has put together a table listing prominent venture capital transactions in Southeast Asia for the week starting November 21, 2022.