Motorsport Games raised $69 million through IPO — the company's valuation exceeded $500 million

Motorsport Games, which develops racing games under a NASCAR license, has entered the stock market. At the start, the company raised $ 69 million, and its market capitalization was estimated at $ 510 million.On the first day of trading on the NASDAQ stock exchange, Motorsport Games shares increased in price by 50% — from $20 to $ 30.

After entering the stock exchange, the parent company Motorsport Network will remain its owner.

Motorsport Games will spend the funds raised to pay off the debt in the amount of $10.4 million. The remaining money will be used to develop mobile games, support your own engine and possible purchases of other studios.

Despite the successful IPO, some experts are skeptical about the prospects of Motorsport Games. Investors consider the company’s narrow specialization to be the main problem — it develops games in the already competitive racing genre, which is divided between major franchises (Need For Speed, Forza, Gran Turismo).

Motorsport Games was founded in 2018 and has not been showing the most stable growth since then. Last year, the company’s revenue grew by 55% to $18.3 million, but its net profit remains low compared to other game studios.

Now Motorsport Games is developing a NASCAR NXT racing simulator for a new generation of consoles. The company also plans for this year to release an updated version of the NASCAR Heat Mobile mobile game, the revenue from in—game purchases in which for 2020 amounted to $ 1.2 million.