2009 23
eRepublik raises €2 million
Published by MartinVarsavsky.net in General with No Comments
eRepublik Labs announced that it has raised €2 million in a series A round from AGF Private Equity, after a seed round of €200,000 in 2007 and an angel round of €550,000 in 2008. The money will be spent in the next 12 to 18 months to develop more features in the game and new products based on the eRepublik platform.
eRepublik is a strategy Massively Multiplayer Online Game (MMOG) with a social component. Alexis Bonte, co-founder and CEO of eRepublik, described it as a “mix between Civilization and Facebook”. It is set in a mirror version of the real world in which players can participate in all kinds of activities, from the mundane day to day tasks (buying food, working, traveling) to national politics, setting economic policy and war waging between countries.
eRepublik is special in that it has been created openly and interactively from a very early stage. The founders began with a live prototype that they improved based on user input. This, combined with its heavy emphasis on user generated content, has allowed eRepublik to quickly and cost effectively grow into a rich gaming experience.
While I am not an investor in eRepublik I am a friend of Alexis Bonte and it is great to see your friends doing very well in tough markets. Alexis was a the Menorca TechTalk.
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Kathlyn on June 23, 2009 ·
After meeting the eRepublik staff in Paris at LeWeb08, I realized simple, engaging games are quite recession-proof. Both Monopoly and Scrabble arose from the Great Depression in the United States, for example: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DZTf3Qsz6Yk&feature=channel_page
Christian on June 23, 2009 ·
Good to see how MMOG projects get traction from users and investors. For me, it´s clear that social games and simulations are a great tool to share knowledge and learn about social situations.
It will improve their user´s soft skills such as: leadeship, creativity, the ability to solve complex problems, improve their decision making or improve their negotiation skills. Seems like a good business just for having fun.
Congrats to Alexis and the team.
Maybe there is a gap to integrate real time 3d simulations on the platform? We are developing a web editor that will be integradted with our graphic engine (sorry for the shameless promo). It´s a shame I did not meet you at Menorca but had to leave on Friday evening.
Good luck!
alexis bonte on June 23, 2009 ·
tks Kathlyn for the video had not seen it yet and really interesting examples with monopoly and scrabble. Christian not sure its in line with what we are trying to do but always curious to listen and learn so don’t hesitate to contact me (easiest is via twitter @alexisbonte)
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alexis bonte on June 23, 2009 ·
Thank you very much for the mention Martin and you might not be an investor but the advice you have given me (and many others) with your blog as well as personally plus the amazing people I have met at the Menorca Techtalk were and still are key in helping me build eRepublik. So big tks!