Yesports – the world’s first eSports engagement platform – has closed an oversubscribed seed round of $2.25m from investors such as Polygon Studios, Alphabit, Kernel Ventures, and Cosmos.

Yesports represents the first cross-chain metaverse engagement platform (MEP) designed to enable more than 500 million eSports fans worldwide to engage fully with their favourite teams in custom-built metaverse experiences.

The Yesports platform will provide access to exclusive content, community initiatives, merchandise, and more by acquiring or holding NFTs.

The raise follows an initial grant from the $100m gaming-centred NFT fund Polygon Studios founded in July.

Via the Yesports marketplace, fans can trade eSports NFTs across a range of ecosystems, including Moonbeam, Ethereum, Polygon, Binance Smart Chain (BSC), and other EVM-compatible layer-1 blockchains.

Yesports will also collaborate with teams to provide fans with a private metaverse experience, allowing them to vote using DAO tokens and access clubhouses and private team NFT marketplaces.

CEO and Founder of Yesports, Sebastian Quinn, explained Web3 and the emerging metaverse allow for much greater fan participation, engagement, and ownership.

“Yesports is the Web3 upgrade the eSports sector has been waiting for and will serve as a portal for eSports fans to participate in this new paradigm,” he said.

“We can’t wait to get building with teams all over the world.”

Steven Bryson-Haynes, VP of Business Development, NFT & Gaming at Polygon Studios, commented “the team at Yesports are building something extremely valuable to the rapidly developing Web3 landscape”.

“The eSporting sector’s fan base and viewing figures are expanding all the time and Yesports will galvanize this by enabling an outlet for fan engagement,” he said.