The Sandbox, an Ethereum metaverse game platform, announced Wednesday that it has raised $20 million in convertible promissory notes at a $1 billion valuation. That makes the long-running project the latest crypto “unicorn,” based on the billion-dollar valuation.
The latest funding round was led by Kingsway Capital and Animoca Brands; Animoca, a prominent metaverse investment firm, is also the parent of The Sandbox’s operating company, Bacasable Global Limited. LG Tech Ventures and True Global Ventures also participated in the round.
"We are deeply honored by the continuing commitment to the vision of The Sandbox, and we're incredibly excited about the future of composable user-generated content games," said Animoca co-founder and executive chairman Yat Siu, in a statement.
With the new funding in tow, The Sandbox’s development team said that its key priorities include improving creator tools, adding new social and gameplay features, and developing a mobile version scheduled for 2025.
Ethereum Game 'The Sandbox' Launches DAO to Let Players Shape Its Future
The Sandbox, an Ethereum-based metaverse game platform, announced Tuesday that it has launched a DAO—or decentralized autonomous organization—to let token holders help shape the future of the game and its economy. Users who own NFT-based LAND plots or hold the game’s SAND token will be able to propose and vote on governance decisions regarding gameplay upgrades and feature additions, future events and rewards initiatives, how “player status” will be determined based on asset ownership, and other...
The Sandbox is one of the most prominent blockchain games, thanks to partnerships with over 400 celebrities and brands—including Snoop Dogg, Gucci, and Paris Hilton—and previously immense demand for in-game land plots sold via NFTs. In fact, someone paid $450,000 worth of crypto for a land plot near Snoop Dogg’s metaverse mansion in 2021.
The game’s SAND token on Ethereum remains one of the 100 most valuable cryptocurrencies in the world based on market cap, per data from CoinGecko. However, the price of its NFT land plots has fallen sharply since metaverse hype peaked in early 2022—from 3.9 ETH ($11,700) to 0.08 ETH ($300) today.
Someone Paid $450K to Be Snoop Dogg’s Metaverse Neighbor
Snoop Dogg is recreating his California mansion in The Sandbox, a decentralized metaverse game on Ethereum that minted its first wave of virtual lots in the “Snoopverse” yesterday. A plot next to Snoop’s virtual property sold today for close to 71,000 SAND, the native token of The Sandbox, which is about $450,000. Virtual land in The Sandbox is being sold as NFTs, which are unique tokens that grant ownership rights over digital items—in this case, plots of digital real estate. The Sandbox LAND...
"Our mission at The Sandbox is to develop creative tools and technologies that bring fairness and new opportunities for all types of creators in the open metaverse," said The Sandbox co-founder and CEO Arthur Madrid, in a release.
Editor’s note: This article was written with the assistance of AI. Edited and fact-checked by Andrew Hayward.
