Legendary venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz (a16z) has announced a $600-million fund called Games Fund One dedicated to investing in gaming startups. The sector witnessed an unprecedented growth on the back of pandemic-induced home confinement in the past couple of years.
Over the last two decades a16z has built a successful portfolio in gaming and gaming-focused startups, having previously backed companies like Zynga, Oculus, Epic Games, Sky Mavis, and Roblox. Games Fund One is its first fund dedicated to the games industry. In a blog post, the firm said this fund has been nearly a decade in the making.
The fund will invest in gaming studios, consumer gaming, and infrastructure offerings.
The fund secured investments from David Baszucki, founder of Roblox; Jason Citron, founder of Discord; Marc Merrill, cofounder of Riot Games; Mike Morhaime, cofounder of Blizzard; Aleks Larsen and Jeffrey Zirlin, cofounders of Sky Mavis; Kevin Lin, cofounder of Twitch, Mark Pincus, founder of Zynga; and Riccardo Zacconi, founder of King.
“Games Fund One is founded on the belief that games will play a pivotal role in defining how we socialize, play, and work over the next century. Having been investors in this space for more than a decade, it’s clear to us the industry has entered a new era,” a16z general partners Andrew Chen, Jonathan Lai, and James Gwertzman said in a blogpost.
