Draftea launches LatAm fantasy football with NFL partnership, new funding – TechCrunch


Draftea, which calls itself the first fantasy sports company in Spanish-speaking Latin America, is taking fantasy football (not football) to the region through a new partnership with the National Football League (NFL) and the NFL Players Association, a labor union. On behalf of the athletes of the league.

Draft founder Alan Jaime Misrahi played football in Mexico’s third division, Stanford, before studying for an MBA and starting the draft. Mexico is the second largest market for the NFL globally, Jaime Misrahi told TechCrunch in an interview.

There are 50 million NFL fans in Mexico, and it’s exciting because everyone in Mexico has their local area. [soccer] They have their team, their European team, their NFL team, their NBA team, their baseball team. We are really passionate about sports in Mexico,” said Jamie Misrahi.

Images of Draftea’s mobile fantasy NFL platform Image Credits: Draft

It launched in January this year on the Daily Fantasy Sports (DFS) platform, which hosts Mexican fantasy football matches. Draftea’s DFS offering is unique in that it offers daily engagement: unlike traditional sports betting platforms like Costa Rica’s Betris or Mexico’s Grupo Caliente, it hosts recurring seasonal games that reflect real-world sports schedules.

Unlike Betcris and Grupo Caliente, Draftea is not a sports betting company where players compete against a central bookmaker – instead, they compete against each other. In a region where the spirit of sportsmanship is evident, Draftea’s local origins and the social nature of the platform help it stand out from other players.

That’s why the NFL chose a startup to develop its own “NFL by Draftea” product, a unique global partnership for the league, according to Jaime Misrahi. “NFL by Draftea” is set to launch today, meaning users can prepare their drafts for the upcoming NFL season this fall.

Draft Recognizes the impact and value athletes can bring to fantasy sports. Inspired by their diverse personalities and unique athletic abilities, the global popularity of NFL players is at an all-time high, and we’re excited to have more fans in Latin America, Therese Whitehead, vice president of consumer products and strategy for NFL Players, the NFLPA’s marketing and licensing arm, told TechCrunch in an email.

In addition to the new partnership, Draftea, Sequoia’s first investment in a Mexican company, has raised new funding from backers new and old. It brought in $20 million for the Series A, led by new investor Stestone Group, with participation from existing investors Sequoia, Kaszek, Bullpen and Courtside Ventures. In addition to the partnerships, athletes including soccer legend Cristiano Ronaldo, Kansas City Chiefs tight end Travis Kelce, Brooklyn Nets basketball player Kevin Durant and Portuguese soccer agent Jorge Mendes have invested in the round as angels.

“[Latin American] Fans are extremely passionate about their favorite players and teams,” Kelce wrote in an email to TechCrunch.

Since seeding in January, the Draft team has grown from 34 employees to 70 in total, primarily in engineering and production, Jamie Misrahi said. While he declined to share how many users are on the platform today or the company’s revenue, he said the number of players using Draft has been growing by “double digits” for more than a week. He added that he has seen a resurgence in GMV as per-user lineups are increasing.

Picture of the Draftea team on a video call

The Draftea team on a video call Image Credits: Draft

“In the draft, you build your dream team to compete against others. What I’m doing is really building our own dream team to win,” Jamie Misrahi said of his plans to continue making new hires.

The payouts for games on Draftea can range from a couple of thousand pesos to hundreds of thousands or even millions of pesos per game every week, Jamie Misrahi said. The platform offers several different game formats, including head-to-head matches and games where 20% of players win payouts, and plans to add new tournament types to meet player demand, he said.

The company is eyeing the FIFA World Cup in Qatar in November, which is expected to be the biggest live sporting event of the year, to create a huge opportunity. Jamie Misrahi said the NFL partnership in Mexico is just the beginning of Draftea’s eventual expansion to all Spanish-speaking countries.

“We definitely want to strengthen our position in the Mexican market, but we’re thinking about what’s next and where we’re going. We want to be a platform for sports fans in the Spanish-speaking world,” said Jamie Misrahi.



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