Seattle-based social gaming startup Rec Room has raised $145 million and reached a value of $3.5 billion.
The massive round continues a big year for Rec Room, which raised $100 million in March and reached a value of $1.25 billion. According to Rec Room, the startup was the first virtual reality company to hit "unicorn status," or a value of at least $1 billion.
“It’s been amazing to watch Rec Room grow from a tiny collection of mini-games into a global platform with millions of experiences built by the community,” Rec Room co-founder and CEO Nick Fajt said in a news release. “There’s still so much more we want to do, and as we head into 2022, we’re excited to build more experiences, expand to new platforms, invest in best in class trust and safety systems, and continue to expand our creator tools.”
With Rec Room, which launched in 2016, users can create an avatar and hang out virtually with friends. Users can also explore and create virtual rooms. Rec Room also launched a vehicle racing element this year. The game is free and available on mobile, PC, game consoles and VR headsets. According to Rec Room, more than 37 million people have played the game, which features more than 12 million rooms.
Rec Room's big raise could help the company with its long-term plan to go public, a goal Fajt previously discussed with the Business Journal. He said the company doesn't have a specific timeframe for going public, but it could happen in the next three to four years.
"Going public is totally in our control. That's a course we can chart. We're seeing a lot of positivity around the gaming space in the public market right now, so I think that enthusiasm is only going to continue for the next couple of years," Fajt told the Business Journal. "That's the course that we're charting. That's the course that we're talking about internally."
Seattle-area startups have raised multiple massive funding rounds in 2021. Companies such as Highspot, Amperity, Stackline and SkyKick, among others, have all raised rounds of at least $100 million. According to recent data from PitchBook and the National Venture Capital Association, across the U.S. there were 597 deals of at least $100 million, raising a total of $136.5 billion during the first nine months of 2021. All of last year, which had been a record year, there were 333 such deals totaling $76.7 billion.
