A16z Games commits $75M to Speedrun game startup accelerator

venturebeat.com:

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A16z Games has started a new Speedrun accelerator and it plans to invest up to $75 million in the next class of pre-seed startups at the intersection of games and technology.

The first Speedrun came together with speed, as the venture capital firm recruited its first class of 32 startups starting at the Game Developers Conference in March.

A16z received more than 1,600 applications and sorted through them in a month. After doing 200 interviews, it chose 32 companies and all of them received investments from A16z. By May, the startups went through an intense four-week Speedrun accelerator program. On top of that, about 80% of the startups received follow-on funding from other investors after a demo day in June.

With the new class, A16z will combine the investment with coaching by some of the games industry’s most seasoned talent, community development across the cohort and industry, and content tailored towards early-stage startups. This time, the program will run for ten weeks starting in January and ending on March 29 during the GDC. The program will culminate with a demo day for the best early-stage investors in the industry to meet some of the best entrepreneurs across Games x Tech.

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Applications for Speedrun 2024 are open from now until September 30. Inteviews will be done by October 15. The program’s investment is set at $500,000 for each startup, and the accelerator will be located in the San Francisco Bay Area for the entire duration of the program.