The Sacramento Angels investment group this summer made an investment into SuperWorld, a company offering the world for sale — virtually.
Some of the angel investors together invested $110,000 into SuperWorld, an online virtual world where users can buy a digital representation of a part of the globe, in 100-by-100-yard plots, said Dave Sanders, a member of the board of directors of the Sacramento Angels.
“It is compelling, and the team they have put together is very compelling,” Sanders said.
SuperWorld is a digital map of the entire surface of the earth. It hits on many of the trending topics in investing in recent years, including non-fungible tokens, cryptocurrency, artificial intelligence, virtual reality and, of course, real estate.
In SuperWorld, the virtual earth is split into 64.8 billion plots, each roughly the size of a city block.
Participants in SuperWorld can buy non-fungible tokens representing that virtual real estate. Non-fungible tokens, or NFTs, are specific units of data stored on a digital ledger, commonly known as a blockchain.
All plots are available for sale at a starting point of 0.1 unit of the cryptocurrency Ether. As of Wednesday, Ether, the cryptocurrency of the Ethereum blockchain, was trading at $3,617.74 a unit, but like other cryptocurrencies, its price is volatile. In the past 52 weeks, Ether has traded as high as $4,891.70 and as low as $718.11
SuperWorld uses non-fungible tokens on the Ethereum blockchain as unique and irreplaceable pieces of property that can be bought, sold, traded or held, Hrish Lotlikar, SuperWorld CEO and co-founder, told the Business Journal, in a virtual meeting.
Advertisers, artists and other SuperWorld property owners can then place content, such as photos or text, on their virtual real estate.
SuperWorld’s board of directors includes Bob Metcalfe, founder of 3Com Corp., and Richard Ling, founding general partner of Rembrandt Venture Partners. Lotlikar is a former investment banker, and he co-founded Rogue Initiative Studios, a Hollywood gaming, film and entertainment studio.
SuperWorld is based in San Francisco, but its team is disbursed globally. Lotlikar lives in Kiev, Ukraine.
In Sacramento, the Tower Bridge, which includes four parcels, has three parcels already owned. About 20 parcels have sold in the Sacramento area, including parts of Capitol Park and some parcels that include Golden 1 Center.
The Sacramento Angels usually invest in local companies, but the angels got connected to Lotlikar because his uncle lives locally, Sanders said.
