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Japan’s Ookami behind sports-centric social network app Player! raises series B round

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See the original story in Japanese. Tokyo-based Ookami, the Japanese startup behind sports entertainment app “Player!”, earlier this month announced that it has raised an undisclosed amount from NTT Docomo Ventures, Mizuho Capital, Asahi Media Lab Ventures and Asics Ventures in its series B round. The raised amount is estimated to be several millions of US dollars as surmised from information emanating from various quarters. It is the fundraising subsequent to the one with 30 million yen (about $270,000) in total from investors including Dai Tamesue (athlete), Uzabase, Yusuke Umeda (CEO of Uzabase), Tomohito Ebine (founder of Opt) and Toshiaki Komtasu (co-founder of Photo Create) in its angel round (in June of 2014 and March of 2015), the one with an undicslosed amount from Gree Ventures in a seed round (in April of 2016), and the one with an undisclosed amount from IMJ Investment Partners (now Spiral Ventures Japan), Gree Ventures and The Asahi Shimbun in a series A round (March of 2017). With this secured money, Ookami is going to strengthen human resource recruitment / development in designer, finance / management and marketing sector. Ookami was founded in April of 2014. In the following year, the team launched the…

See the original story in Japanese.

Tokyo-based Ookami, the Japanese startup behind sports entertainment app “Player!”, earlier this month announced that it has raised an undisclosed amount from NTT Docomo Ventures, Mizuho Capital, Asahi Media Lab Ventures and Asics Ventures in its series B round. The raised amount is estimated to be several millions of US dollars as surmised from information emanating from various quarters.

It is the fundraising subsequent to the one with 30 million yen (about $270,000) in total from investors including Dai Tamesue (athlete), Uzabase, Yusuke Umeda (CEO of Uzabase), Tomohito Ebine (founder of Opt) and Toshiaki Komtasu (co-founder of Photo Create) in its angel round (in June of 2014 and March of 2015), the one with an undicslosed amount from Gree Ventures in a seed round (in April of 2016), and the one with an undisclosed amount from IMJ Investment Partners (now Spiral Ventures Japan), Gree Ventures and The Asahi Shimbun in a series A round (March of 2017).

With this secured money, Ookami is going to strengthen human resource recruitment / development in designer, finance / management and marketing sector.

Team members of Ookami
Image credit: Ookami

Ookami was founded in April of 2014. In the following year, the team launched the mobile app Player! for iOS, pivoting its concept from sports news platform to sports SNS which distributes progress or results of games and allows users to share the excitement in real time with other users watching the same game. The app was winner of both App Store Best of 2015 and Good Design Award in 2016. Player! for Apple Watch was launched in September of 2016 and that for Android will be likewise, soon. Coincidentally with this fundraising, Ookami announced that it has added the following three functions to Player!.

  • Reminder function about favorite teams
  • Launch of Player! for web
  • Enhancement of content coverage as to college / amateur sports

Ookami participated in Tokyu Accelerate Program 3rd batch last year and won NewWork Award on its demo day. As a demonstration in the program, the team tested a real-time distribution of process of Japan vs. North Korea of E-1 Football Championship last December 9th, using the outdoor large-display Q’s Eye in Shibuya.

Now that FIFA World Cup is being held in Russia, Player! has been distributing proceedings of the games over a two-week period beginning June 18th at digital signage at major railway stations in Tokyo and Osaka.

Translated by Taijiro Takeda
Edited by “Tex” Pomeroy

Japan’s Ookami, offering social network app for sports fans, secures series A round

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See the original story in Japanese. Tokyo-based Ookami, the Japanese startup developing the “Player!” sports entertainment app, announced on Friday that the company raised an undisclosed amount from IMJ Investment Partners (IMJ-IP), Gree Ventures, The Asahi Shimbun, and a number of confidential individual investors in a Series A round. For Ookami, this follows an undisclosed amount raised in a seed round from Gree Ventures last May, making this Gree Venture’s second investment in the company. Prior to the seed round, Ookami held angel rounds in June of 2014 and March of 2015, in which they raised a total of 30 million yen (around $260K US) from athlete Dai Tamesue, Uzabase, Uzabase CEO Yusuke Umeda, Tomohito Ebine (founder of OPT Holdings), and Toshiaki Komatsu (Co-founder of Photocreate), but according to information from the stakeholders the total amount raised this time in the Series A round is expected to be on a scale of several hundred million yen (or several million US dollars). Ookami was founded in April of 2014. In April 2015 they released the mobile app “Player!” for iOS, and pivoted from a sports news distribution platform to the one that reports sports games live, with a social network function…

Image credit: ookami

See the original story in Japanese.

Tokyo-based Ookami, the Japanese startup developing the “Player!” sports entertainment app, announced on Friday that the company raised an undisclosed amount from IMJ Investment Partners (IMJ-IP), Gree Ventures, The Asahi Shimbun, and a number of confidential individual investors in a Series A round. For Ookami, this follows an undisclosed amount raised in a seed round from Gree Ventures last May, making this Gree Venture’s second investment in the company.

Prior to the seed round, Ookami held angel rounds in June of 2014 and March of 2015, in which they raised a total of 30 million yen (around $260K US) from athlete Dai Tamesue, Uzabase, Uzabase CEO Yusuke Umeda, Tomohito Ebine (founder of OPT Holdings), and Toshiaki Komatsu (Co-founder of Photocreate), but according to information from the stakeholders the total amount raised this time in the Series A round is expected to be on a scale of several hundred million yen (or several million US dollars).

Ookami was founded in April of 2014. In April 2015 they released the mobile app “Player!” for iOS, and pivoted from a sports news distribution platform to the one that reports sports games live, with a social network function that allows users to share their reactions in real-time with other users watching the progress and results of the same game. In December 2015 it was labeled the “App Store Best of 2015”, and in 2016 it won the “Good Design Award.”

Ookami revealed plans to strengthen the news distribution functions of Player! In addition to revamping the news functions, they will partner with a major data stadium for the broadcasting of sports scores, and information regarding both J-league football and B-league basketball games in Japan will be offered in real time. Additionally, their information can be further enriched through their partnership with the Asahi Shimbun, a company that participates in some 180 sports events in Japan yearly.

The Asahi Shumbun, participants in this round, released the following comments in excerpt.

We believe that through multiplying various sports businesses and contents with Ookami’s Player!, a new way of enjoying sports, and communicating about sports, separate from a newspaper, becomes possible; so we entered into the partnership.

GREE Ventures, who participated in the latest investment round along with IMJ-IP, appears to make a pure money injection. The following is an excerpt from comments by IMJ-IP.

With the upcoming Tokyo Olympics, the field of sports is expected to experience great growth in Japan. As a part of this, we recognize the fact that Player! is a new medium that makes live sports content possible and offers the optimal smart-phone customer experience, and judge that their management team is one of high executive power, so we have made the decision to support them.

Image credit: ookami

Although Ookami created the above figure (and therefore it is not necessarily an objective interpretation), the digital distribution of sports content is definitely bustling, even with profitable and not so profitable players.

To illustrate other digital sports startups in Japan, there is Spotomo and Spotomo GC, which offer online lesson services, with investors like Docomo Ventures, DeNA (TSE: 2432), Sirius Partners, and ABC Dream Ventures. Link Sports, which runs the amateur sports score and competition management service TeamHub, raised about 60 million yen (around $523K US) in financing from Venture United and debt from the Japan Policy Finance Corporation.

In Japan, DAZN (pronounced dazon) and Softbank’s Suponavi Live are advancing, challenging each other over Internet and mobile distribution, leading to a rise in broadcasting fees. However, they alone cannot consume all the video distribution, and it seems there is a development in which they discount and resell (sublicense) the broadcasting rights to other satellite broadcasters and cable television broadcasting companies. Overseas, Twitter contributes $10 million US to  streamcast NFL games worldwide, and Amazon is moving to acquire broadcasting rights for sports.

For Ookami, Player! is not a distributor of sports video content, but instead focuses on score information related to games as well as SNS, thereby leaving them unaffected by these big players. Instead, through the benefit of sublicensing, etc., in the future it will be possible to deliver videos by revenue sharing with the broadcasting rights holder.

Ookami CEO Taiyo Ogata says:

I think it is possible to create a flexible operation if you can watch and listen to programs on a game-by-game basis (not on a per-channel basis), or if the price is changed when you watch from the second half.

60% of Player!’s users are under 35, a demographic that existing sports broadcasters are not reaching. In terms of being able to distribute video to this demographic, I think that it will be possible for major platformers to merge with Ookami.

Ogata also revealed that they are preparing several other user experiences only possible through Player! I look forward to a number of big announcements this year which can be expected in connection to this.

Translated by Amanda Imasaka
Edited by Masaru Ikeda

Japan’s Ookami behind sports live app Player! raises seed round from Gree Ventures

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See the original story in Japanese. Tokyo-based Ookami, which is behind sports live app named Player!, today announced that it had fundraised an undisclosed amount from Gree Ventures in its seed round. This follows previous angel rounds totaling 30 million yen (about $275,000) from Dai Tamesue (Japanese athlete), Uzabase, Yusuke Umeda (CEO of Uzabase), Tomohito Ebine (founder of Internet ad agency Opt) and Toshiaki Komatsu (co-founder of Photocreate), in June 2014 and March 2015. This fund will be spent for enhancement of the development system. Ookami started in April of 2014. A year later, in April of 2015, it had officially launched mobile app Player! for iOS. Although initially commenced as a sports news distribution platform, as repeating pivot, the app has evolved into a sport-focused social network platform distributing the progress or results of sports game live to enable users to share feelings with other audience users in real-time. In December 2015, the app won the title of App Store Best of 2015. In sports games on Player!, a baseball game between the Yomiuri Giants and the Hiroshima Carp teams for example, users can choose which team to back. By watching the progress of the game, users can chat…

ookami-player_featuredimage

See the original story in Japanese.

Tokyo-based Ookami, which is behind sports live app named Player!, today announced that it had fundraised an undisclosed amount from Gree Ventures in its seed round. This follows previous angel rounds totaling 30 million yen (about $275,000) from Dai Tamesue (Japanese athlete), Uzabase, Yusuke Umeda (CEO of Uzabase), Tomohito Ebine (founder of Internet ad agency Opt) and Toshiaki Komatsu (co-founder of Photocreate), in June 2014 and March 2015. This fund will be spent for enhancement of the development system.

Ookami started in April of 2014. A year later, in April of 2015, it had officially launched mobile app Player! for iOS. Although initially commenced as a sports news distribution platform, as repeating pivot, the app has evolved into a sport-focused social network platform distributing the progress or results of sports game live to enable users to share feelings with other audience users in real-time. In December 2015, the app won the title of App Store Best of 2015.

In sports games on Player!, a baseball game between the Yomiuri Giants and the Hiroshima Carp teams for example, users can choose which team to back. By watching the progress of the game, users can chat in the comment window and enjoy the game with the same team’s fans. Detailed information on the progress of sports game is gained through reproduction of photos or texts with content-usage permitted from more than 150 sports media including Soccer King (by From One) or Gekisaka (by Kodansha). As for live broadcasting, although the latest version of Player! supports that technically, the broadcasting fee for sports games is generally quite expensive. Therefore, the company plans to secure video content through tie-up with companies that hold broadcasting rights in the future.

CEO of Ookami Taiyo Ogata commented on the app:

Concerning monetization, I think it is rather easy to connect the app with the sports game ticket business. On the other hand, connection with Toto (Japanese state-run sport promotion lottery) may not be so easy. […]

The average stay time for the app exceeds 15 minutes per use due to the content characteristics, and that is the advantage which overwhelms other mobile apps.

So far, Ookami has launched apps only for iOS in order to focus on interface design of the apps. However, it aims to launch Player! for PC and Android by the Rio de Janeiro Olympic games in August.

In this field, Softbank (TSE:9434) and its subsidiary Yahoo Japan (TSE:4689) had started a service with mobile app named Sponavi-Live since this March, which enables the viewing of live sports game broadcasting in seven genres at 3,000 yen (about $28) or 500 yen (about $4.6) only for Softbank mobile users at a monthly charge.

Translated by Taijiro Takeda
Edited by “Tex” Pomeroy

ookami-team-members
CEO of Ookami Taiyo Ogata (second from right, in front row) and members of his firm