6 June 2024
Blue Star Capital
plc
("Blue
Star" or the "Company")
Dynasty
Update
Blue Star Capital plc (AIM: BLU),
the investing company with a focus on esports and blockchain and
its applications within gaming and payments, provides the following
update for Dynasty Gaming & Media Pte Ltd ("Dynasty"), an
investee company, as a result of Dynasty's first update to
shareholders following its acquisition of Googly Media Holdings Pte Ltd ("Googly").
Googly (India)
Dynasty's directors consider India
to be one of the fastest growing gaming markets in the world with
more than 500 million gamers presently which is expected to grow to
700 million in the coming years. Dynasty advises that it has
started to make progress in entering India's video gaming sector
and, despite some early challenges, has acquired more than 23,000
fully registered users during its beta phase at a customer
acquisition cost ("CAC") of c. US$0.80 per user.
Dynasty has recently finalised
agreements with Razorpay as its payment gateway partner and expects
to have its payment gateway live and operational within the coming
month. This will enable Dynasty to start monetising its Beta
users while simultaneously commencing customer acquisition
activities at scale.
Let's Play Live Acquisition (Oceania)
Dynasty has agreed to acquire Let's
Play Live ("LPL") in an all-share transaction approximately for 15
per cent. of Dynasty's issued shares. Dynasty has been operating
its Australia & New Zealand platform business under a 50/50
joint venture with LPL since May 2023.
LPL is the largest gaming tournament
operator and broadcaster in Oceania, and the fastest growing in
Southeast Asia, and the exclusive partner for many of the world's
leading publishers operating major gaming events in the region,
including Epic Games, EA, Riot Games, and Supercell.
Dynasty advises that the acquisition
of LPL will provide it with strategic and highly complementary
capabilities in the areas of tournament organisation, production,
and broadcast and it will also deliver exclusive game event IP from
the world's leading games publishers.
The Dynasty board expects the
transaction to be completed by 30 June 2024 and for the LPL
business to contribute positive cashflows from
completion.
As a result of their cooperation to
date, Dynasty and LPL have recently delivered the
following:
1.
Partnership Agreement signed with Revolut who become naming rights
sponsor for the Valorant Challengers Tour at the Oceania World
Champs qualifiers.
2. An
exclusive agreement signed for the Oceania region World Champs
Qualifiers with the global master rights holder for Fortnite, the
biggest game in the region. This event takes place next month and
will provide significant sponsorship and user engagement and
monetisation opportunities.
3. A
Partnership Agreement signed with National Australia Bank ("NAB")
as their inaugural gaming partner for its new NAB Gateway,
launching this month. The NAB Gateway will provide a comprehensive
payments solution for our customers, including Visa, Master, Apple
and Googly Pay, BNPL, recurring payments etc.
Lightning Dragon (Philippines)
Dynasty's Lighting Dragon platform has
been in an extended Beta phase while it introduced payment gateway
partners and content providers. Dynasty advises that it has now
integrated PayMaya into its platform, one of the Philippines's
leading e-wallet and payment gateway providers with 45m
users.
Dynasty expects Lightning Dragon's to
launch, with two major publisher-led prize pool events, within the
next quarter. Its in-country partner, the Vera Media Group,
has committed to a considerable marketing and promotional spend
that the Dynasty board expects to drive significant platform
growth.
Product Update
During the recent quarter, Dynasty
launched User Generated Tournaments ("UGT"), which empowers users
to create their own tournaments and use micro-transactions to
enhance their experience. This provides the creators of UGTs the
ability to earn fees from Dynasty's platform, effectively becoming
paid tournament organisers themselves.
In the second half of the year,
Dynasty will launch its new Premium Subscriptions product and seek
to expand its subscriber base by making subscriptions more
accessible and appealing to a diverse range of users.
Strategy
Dynasty advises that its focus for
the next few quarters will be on using its unique content and
significant publisher marketing support to maximise traffic and
monetisation across all platforms. with the objective of
significantly growing the number of registered users and paying
subscribers. The directors expect to reach monthly cash flow
break even within two quarters following which they may seek to
further expand into other revenue generating areas including
betting and AI and potential new platform launches in new
geographic areas, including the Middle East and Latin
America.
Blue Star currently owns
approximately 2.4 per cent of Dynasty.
For further information, please
contact:
Blue Star Capital plc
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+44 (0) 777 178 2434
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Tony Fabrizi
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Cairn Financial Advisers LLP
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+44 (0) 20 7213 0880
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(Nominated Adviser)
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Jo Turner / Liam Murray
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Axis Capital Markets Limited
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+44 (0) 20 3026 0449
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(Sole Broker)
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Ben Tadd / Lewis Jones
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About Blue Star
Blue Star is an investing company
with a focus on new technologies. Blue Star's investments include
SatoshiPay Limited, an incubator and service provider to de-fi
businesses using blockchain technology; Dynasty Gaming & Media
Pte. Ltd., whose B2B white label platform is a full-stack gaming
ecosystem; and Sthaler Limited, an identity and payments technology
business which enables a consumer to identify themselves and pay
using just their finger.