Last Updated on May 18, 2023
Quick take:
- TinyTap, a web3 education platform by Animoca brands has raised $8.5 million.
- The fundraising was backed by Sequoia China, Liberty City Ventures, Kingsway Capital, Shima Capital, Polygon, GameFi Ventures, and others.
- The fresh capital will be used to add more web3 elements to TinyTap’s web2 platform which already boasts 9.2 million registered members.
Animoca Brands’ web3 education platform TinyTap has announced an $8.5 million funding round from Sequoia China, Liberty City Ventures, Kingsway Capital, Shima Capital, Polygon, GameFi Ventures, and others.
The company said it will use the fresh capital to accelerate global expansion and ramp up the development of its EdTech app with more web3 features.
TinyTap already boasts 9.2 million registered members. Animoca Brands wants to convert it into an alternative Web3 education system that empowers teachers by improving their earning opportunities.
It also gives parents and communities an opportunity to promote their preferred educational materials through the platform.
In June last year, Animoca Brands acquired TinyTap for a reported consideration payment of $38.875 million in cash and shares.
In an exclusive inquiry seeking clarification about the new funding, Animoca Brands co-founder and executive chairman Yat Siu told NFTgators: “The fundraise we are announcing now is indeed funding (i.e., new money) for the purpose of business expansion – to grow the Web3 business of TinyTap in order to effectively tackle the ~5 trillion dollar education market.”
“The consideration of $38.875 million you wrote about in June was the amount that Animoca Brands paid to acquire TinyTap from the shareholders of TinyTap. That was not new funding for TinyTap,” he added.
TinyTap enables teachers to earn by teaching and minting educational materials as NFTs. Parents and the community can then endorse curriculum subjects by buying ownership in subject domains and earning royalties from content hosted in those domains.
When the NFTs are sold on the app, the proceeds are shared with the course creators, with the NFT buyers assuming the role of co-publishers.
According to TinyTap, since the first auction of educational materials minted as NFTs went in Q4 last year, buyers have earned approximately 8.2% (or 19.7% annualized) in co-publishing income from the total NFT sale proceeds.
The inaugural auction sold for a total of 138.926 ETH ~ $228,000 at the time of sale, with teachers receiving 50% of the total sale or 67.7 ETH approximately $110,000.
One creator Misa Matsuzaki who owns two Publisher NFTs earned about $7,823 from November 2022 to March 2024 just by co-publishing associated courses.
“TinyTap helps teachers to actualize great ideas into educational content that can be accessed regardless of location – for example, one of the courses I bought was adapted for Japan. I did the first translation and voice-over myself with the help of the TinyTap team. I look forward to seeing how Japan will welcome these exciting new possibilities in education! I would like to see more use cases like TinyTap Publisher NFTs, which are so much more interesting than just having NFTs sitting in our wallet!“ Matsuzaki said in a press statement on Tuesday.
According to Yogev Shelly, CEO of TinyTap, the performance of Publisher NFTs genesis auctions has demonstrated how the education industry fits in in the Web3 community, with TinyTap playing the role of a new powerful and equitable incentivised system.
“By pairing educational content creators with interested promoters, we are able to benefit all parties fairly and take a significant step in our goal to put the power of learning back in the hands of educators, students, and the community,” added Shelly.
****
Stay up to date:
Subscribe to our newsletter using this link – we won’t spam!
