The video game talent management agency Loaded announced it secured $20 million in a recently-held funding round that will help the organization’s expansion efforts. As a result, the company’s COO, Josh Swartz has been named Loaded’s new CEO. Additionally, Briget Davidson has been appointed the President of Loaded’s Talent Division.
Beyond the promotions of Swartz and Davidson, Loaded also made co-founder Brandon Freytag the company’s Chief Creator Monetization Officer. Meanwhile, Niles Heron will be the Chief Communications and Culture Officer. Also, the business hired Jeff Pabst to be COO and Paul Conroy to be the President of Loaded Ventures.
The private equity firm Coral Tree Partners led this funding round. In turn, Coral Tree’s Alan Resnikoff and Henry Shapiro will now join Loaded’s Board of Directors.
The money acquired in this funding round will also go towards growing Loaded’s talent roster and services. The company plans to invest in data and analytics tools while potentially extending brand partnerships to other factions of gaming like web3 and the metaverse.
“Since its inception, Loaded has supported the work of an incredible roster of talent who have been responsible for helping shape the future of gaming,” Josh Swartz said in a statement. “Now, as non-endemic brands and companies look to engage with the gaming community, we are able to combine our deep subject matter expertise, insights, and relationships to improve and evolve the industry for everyone who wants to be part of it. Funding from Coral Tree Partners allows us to target acquisitions in the data and analytics sector of gaming, which will generate new opportunities for all our talent, brand, and publisher clients.”
The Profit‘s Take:
Well… now they’re loaded! HA! Get it?! I get that gaming and esports are hot markets right now, but an agency is (fundamentally) a pretty limited business. It’s a service business. It’s all based on the number of accounts you can manage with the number of people you have. Maybe the industry hype has gone too far and spread to companies that aren’t scalable. Also, I don’t think it should expand its representation to other forms of entertainment. That would be a huge mistake on Loaded’s part. Why not create a niche for yourself where you can be totally dominant and make other agencies irrelevant because you control such a large part of the gaming celebrity market? I sincerely hope they focus on their gaming niche and not other forms of entertainment. If I was a gamer, I would prefer to be with a specialist, not a jack-of-all-trades organization.
(All information was provided by LinkedIn and VentureBeat)
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