Gaming startup mod.io raises US$4m from Sequoia's Surge

Sharanya Pillai

Published Fri, Dec 4, 2020 · 03:06 PM

MOD.IO, a content service for gaming studios, has raised US$4 million in seed capital led by led by Sequoia Capital India's Surge programme and the Makers Fund, the startup announced on Friday.

Other investors in the round include gaming venture firm Play Ventures, UK's GameTech Ventures and online publisher Machinefloor. mod.io part of the fourth cohort of Surge, a bi-annual scale-up programme by Sequoia for startups across South-east Asia and India.

The startup provides gaming studios with tools and analytics solutions that enable developers to have control and flexibility over player modifications - or "mods" - as well as other user-generated content (UGC). Studios can thus support the mods and track key metrics to understand content trends.

mod.io also gives studios an easy way to implement mod support into their games, enabling players to browse, instal and manage their mod collections in-game or through a Web interface.

Since its launch in March 2019, mod.io has enabled UGC to be shared in over 50 games across 11 different storefronts, on platforms including PC, Xbox, iOS and Android, the startup said. It claims to have 65 million UGC downloads since its launch.

Scott Reismanis, co-founder of mod.io, said: "We foresee that mods will be a staple on every platform and elevated to the position of a key game feature. Creator economies will thrive and become more commonplace, with mod communities gravitating away from store-controlled solutions and towards agnostic platforms such as mod.io."