Game streaming platform Rooter raises $25 million from Lightbox, March Gaming, others

Rooter said it has raised $25 million (about Rs 185 crore) in funding led by Lightbox, March Gaming and Duane Park Ventures. 9Unicorns, ADvantage, Capital-A, and Goal Ventures also participated in the series A funding round along with existing investors, including IeAD Sports and Health Tech Partners, a statement said.

Through this funding round, the company also facilitated the secondary sale for a few of its shareholders and an exit route for a few employees through ESOP buyback, it added. Rooter is looking to almost double its team size by hiring across divisions to add to its 55-member team based in the capital city.

Founded by Piyush Kumar and Dipesh Agarwal, Rooter has 8.5 million monthly active users and over 30 million downloads. Around 1 million unique users create gaming content on the Rooter platform every month.

The company aims to emerge as the dominant player in India's creator economy by building a base of the next 5,00,000 professional game streamers through its gaming and e-sports platform, the statement said. According to a report issued by RedSeer and Lumikai, India is expected to be home to 700 million gamers by 2025.

Rooter has been growing at a blistering pace over the last 18 months in tandem with the ballooning mobile gaming market in India, and this fresh infusion of funds by such marquee domestic and international investors only validates our work, Rooter co-founder and CEO Piyush Kumar said. Our community of streamers has been witnessing amazing engagement on our platform, which has allowed us to increase our revenues in the last six months. Dipesh and I look forward to working with our supporters to make Rooter the largest gaming company in the country within the next two years, he added.

A&W Capital, a UK-based boutique investment bank, was the exclusive financial advisor and Delhi-based Ahlawat and Associates was Rooter's legal counsel on this deal.