Rivalry brings in C$3.3m in private placement, difficulties persist

Rivalry has finalized a non-brokered private placement of units of the company, resulting in C$3.32m in gross proceeds. Confirming the deal in a press release on December 30, Rivalry said that it had issued 22,146,851units, pricing them C$0.15 each.

Rivalry misses private placement target, but remains buoyant

The transaction has been carried out in several tranches, including with a first tranche earlier in November and December, and now the final and third tranche reported at the end of last month. The final tally fell from the originally planned-for amount of C$4.2m which Rivalry had been hoping to raise through the placement.

Rivalry was established in 2017, and it has quickly gained popularity and global recognition. Operating as a Canadian company, Rivalry.gg quickly expanded across multinational markets and focused on offering esports betting products.

Leveraging its expertise in the esports vertical, however, the company quickly proceeded to push into both sports betting and casino, coming up with original designs for its games that sought to appeal to younger generations of gamers still of the legal gambling age.

Rivalry was doing better than other esports-first entities at the time such as Unikrn and Luckbox, both of which have had to wind down their B2C offers over the past years, as esports, and their subsequent forays into other gambling verticals failed to materialize a significant financial gain.

Rivalry, however, is far from such a bleak scenario, but despite this, the company is feeling pressure and headwinds. In 2024 alone, the company had undergone two layoffs, reducing its workforce by about half.

Third-quarter net revenue down, but transformative gains were achieved

The company saw a big drop in its third-quarter results in 2024, taking a 25% dive in net revenue, and hastening its decision to strengthen its current operations. However, company CEO Steven Salz said at the time that the third quarter has been one of the most deeply transformational periods for the company since it was founded.

He is confident that because of embarking on what was described as an ambitious business evolution, short-term net revenue may indeed suffer a little.

There is no cause for alarm, Salz argued. The present private placement, although slightly short of its intended target, is a sign that investors, skittish as they are, still see value in backing Rivalry.

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