Hiro Capital gives London its second SPAC listing, launches second fund at €300 million

Focusing on the video games industry, metaverse technologies, creator platforms, and gamified fitness, London-based Hiro Capital has announced its second fund at €300 million, now more than doubling the firms’ first outing. Hiro is targeting investments at the Seed, Series A, and Series B stage in European and North American startups, however, the company notes that it is open to selective rest-of-the-world investments. 

Borrowing a page from Neal Stephenson’s seminal sci-fi classic Snow Crash, since its founding in 2018 Hiro Capital has been a steadfast backer of sci-fi driven storytelling IPs primarily in the video games industry, and now the emerging metaverse.

With its first fund, Hiro Capital has made 21 investments in companies including London’s FitXR, Lisbon-based FRVR, Keen Games of Frankfurt, Stockholm’s Snowprint, and LIV from Prague. And perhaps a bit of a stretch here, but obviously viewed as a solid investment, the firm also co-led a $22 million Series C round in London-based gamified femtech Elvie.

While most SPAC launches have chosen to stay away from the London Stock Exchange for a wide variety of reasons, Hiro became the lead sponsor in a video games industry and metaverse tech-focused special purpose acquisitions vehicle, aptly titled Hiro Metaverse Acquisitions 1, and raised £115 million on the 2nd of February. Marking only the second SPAC listing on London’s books, the vehicle began trading on the 7th of February and is targeting acquisitions in the $600 million - $2.25 billion range.

“Our goal with Hiro is to bring founder-focused venture funding to games studios and metaverse technology creators. In 2022 we are at a pivotal moment in the very early phases of the metaverse, VR, AR and web3 — these revolutions will take at least a decade and much of the creativity and technology innovation will start in Games,” comments founding general partner Luke Alvarez. “Our new fund gives us more firepower to find and develop emerging stars and level them up to global scale.”