Arena Club, the sports trading cards platform founded by Derek Jeter has closed a $10 million Series A round of fundraising.
Arena Club now has $20 million in total funding. The company is working to bring the first-ever fully digital card show to the market.
Investors HTML13, DefyVC, and Lightspeed Ventures were the principals of the funding round.
“We are thrilled to announce this latest funding raise which will allow us to continue growing within the fast-paced sports collectible market,” Co-Founder and CEO of Arena Club Brian Lee said in a release. “Our team is thankful for the group of investors – led by M13, who see the bright future of the trading card hobby and our platform.”
All of the companies involved in this funding round have strong track records in tech, sports, and/or collectibles. M13 boasts the Web3 sports app Locker Room, and Stepn, while Lightspeed Ventures supports Fan Controlled football.
Arena Club claims it will use the funding “scale operations and attract world-class talent and meet consumers there are in the current state the hobby is at.” The platform will also be enhanced to support trading, buying and selling functions.
“Since we launched Arena Club, it has been fun to see the positive response from consumers about our platform,” Jeter said. “Providing users with a digital card show allows us to use our first-class technology to give collectors from all over the world the luxury of being able to get the full trading card show experience at their fingertips. The future for Arena Club is bright and we have some great things ahead.”
Arena Club was launched in September 2022 and is billed as the first-ever marketplace for trading cards.
Arena Club allows members to join and trade, buy, sell or trade their cards. They also have the option of having their cards graded in Arena Club’s controlled vault.
