US professional football league NFL and Dapper Labs, the crypto business behind the NBA Top Shot non-fungible tokens (NFTs) and the Flow blockchain, are planning to unveil a new digital collectibles marketplace this week, Sports Business Journal reported, citing an undisclosed source.
While details of the partnership have not been disclosed, sources close to the deal say it could make Dapper Labs the league’s second-biggest source of digital licensing revenue, preceded only by games maker EA Sports.
Both the NFL and the NFL Players Association are to take equity in Dapper Labs which recently raised about USD 250m at a valuation of USD 7.6bn. Dapper Labs declared it planned to use the new capital to continue to scale and support major additional brand-driven sports, entertainment, and music-based products coming online and being developed on Flow.
Partners expect the new marketplace to be launched before the end of the NFL season. The league’s regular season runs between September 9, 2021 and January 9, 2022. The forthcoming partnership is to also include a minimum guarantee and royalties.
The new project would build on the success of Dapper Labs collaboration with the NBA which paved the way for the launch of the Top Shop marketplace last October. The platform allows customers to buy and sell NBA-themed NFTs.
At 7:30 UTC, Top Shot had a 24-hour NFT sales volume of about USD 576,000, with 8,208 traders and 10,358 sales, according to data from DappRadar. Since the platform’s launch, the sales volume has reached close to USD 685m, with 446,458 traders responsible for nearly 8.9m NFT sales.
Source: Cryptonews
