Esports and gaming organization M80 announced Thursday that it has partnered with recently launched video game community and rewards platform Forge.
Financial terms and duration of this partnership were not disclosed.
Under the terms of this new deal, M80 will feature Forge branding across all of its esports teams (jersey placement branding, and through its social media and streaming platform channels). In addition, the organizations will collaborate to create content promoting the platform.
M80’s professional players will join Forge as users and ambassadors, with the goal of sharing their achievements across the games they play. In addition, M80 talent will collaborate in creating “educational and promotional content released by Forge” to showcase the platform’s connectivity and other features such as its in-game and platform-specific rewards program (which promises in-game currency, in-game cosmetic items, and more).
Forge is currently in beta, which officially launched on Oct. 18. The company also recently announced an $11M USD seed funding round led by Makers Fund, BITKRAFT Ventures, and Animoca Brands. The company is led by serial entrepreneur and former professional Quake player Dennis “Thresh” Fong, Crunchyroll founder Kun Gao, and Cyance founder George Ng.
In June, M80 announced a $3M seed funding round led by ExpertDojo, VT Technology Ventures, and Practical Venture Capital.
M80 said at the time that it would use the funds to “expand its footprint across esports, content creation, and consumer products.” M80 also revealed plans to use some of that funding to become a “web3-enabled gaming and esports company,” through a division called M80 Labs.